
Class I 
Book_^ 



sJ_ 



PRESENTED BY 



Power in Weakness : 



MEMOKIALS 



THE EEY. WILLIAM KHODES, 

OF DAMERHAM. 

/ 



BY CHARLES STANFORD, 

AUTHOR OF " CENTRAL TRUTHS," &C. &C. 



' ' Know how sublime a thing it is 
To suffer and be strong." 

Longfellow. 



Second Edition. 



LONDON: 
JACKSON AND WALFORD, 

18, st. Paul's churchyard. 

1860. 



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A<\$ 



,51 



LONDON: 

REED AND PARDON, PRINTERS, 

PATERNOSTER ROW. 



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INTRODUCTION. 



The writer of the following "Memorials" has 
been told that he should introduce them by some 
account of the motives which have led to their 
publication. His statement is simply this : — After 
the death of Mr. Rhodes, it was the earnest hope of 
his widow, that Mr. Eyland, his earliest and most 
esteemed friend, might be able to prepare for the 
press a short essay on his life, with a selection from 
his papers. That gentleman, however, was obliged 
to decline the undertaking from want of leisure. 
She then applied to the present writer, wishing him 
to write a biography, and offering to defray the 
charge of the work ; but he also felt obliged to 
excuse himself, partly from a similar reason, partly 
from the conviction that nothing he could write 
would reach her enthusiastic ideal of what was due 
to her husband's memory ; and also from the fear 



IV INTRODUCTION. 

that a book written by an unknown scribe about an 
unknown worthy, would secure but a very limited 
acceptance, and thus, perhaps, with her straitened 
circumstances, occasion her some fresh pecuniary 
anxiety. When, however, a few months later, this 
excellent lady died, he again thought over the 
matter. The more he examined the manuscripts 
left by Mr. Hhodes, and the more he studied the 
beautiful spirit of his life, the more deeply did he 
feel that it could not be the will of God for such a 
life to remain a secret. There seemed to be no 
person but himself fully acquainted with it, and at 
the same time charged with the duty of making it 
known ; to relieve his sense of responsibility, there- 
fore, he first contributed a few articles on the 
subject to the Baptist Magazine, and the substance 
of these, with many fresh biographical particulars 
and literary extracts, he has now collected. He 
begs to present his grateful acknowledgments to all 
who have favoured him with a sight of letters 
written by his late revered friend ; and it is his 
earnest prayer to Almighty God, that He may be 
pleased to make this small service useful to the 
Church : especially that it may afford some guid- 



INTRODUCTION, V 

ance and encouragement to students for the Chris- 
tian ministry; to some of Christ's afflicted disci- 
ples; to some who are " poor, yet making many 
rich \ " and to some of his slighted but devoted 
servants in the field of rural missionary labours, 
vrho are doing their best, with God's help, to make 
"the wilderness rejoice, and the solitary places 
glad." 

Camber well, October, 1858, 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

PAGE 
CHILDHOOD— YOUTH — CONVERSION . . . .1 

CHAPTER II. 

DEDICATION TO THE SERVICE OF GOD — STUDENT-LIFE 

AT BRISTOL AND EDINBURGH .... 8 

CHAPTER III. 

DISAPPOINTMENT 19 

CHAPTER IV. 

HELPLE&S AFFLICTION 33 

CHAPTER V. 

THE VILLAGE PASTORATE 48 

CHAPTER VI. 

LETTERS ON DISPUTED QUESTIONS IN RELIGION . .61 

CHAPTER VII. 

LETTERS ON THE DEITY OF JESUS, ADDRESSED TO AN 

INQUIRER 81 



Vlll CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER VIII. 

PAGE 

MARRIED LIFE 123 

CHAPTER IX. 

"high thoughts and humble doings" . . .129 

CHAPTER X. 

CLOSING SCENES '. . J 42 






POWEK IN WEAKNESS. 



CHAPTEE I. 

"Within this leaf, to every eye 
So little worth, doth hidden lie 
Most rare and subtle fragrancy. " 

Dr. "Wilberforce, Bishop of Oxford. 



SL 



CHILDHOOD. YOUTH. — CONVERSION. 

John Foster says, " The story of many a com- 
mon soldier, or a highwayman, or a gipsy, or a 
deserted child, and many a beggar, will keep awake 
the attention which is much inclined to slumber 
over the account of a philosopher." Perhaps, there- 
fore, little interest will be excited in some minds by 
this account of Mr. Rhodes, in whose life the prin- 
cipal events were processes of thought, and who 
had but little " external biography ; " who passed 
through no strange scene, and was the subject of no 
picturesque adventure ; yet he was such a noble 
and holy man, was endowed with such rich gifts as 



2 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

a Christian teacher, and was at the same time so 
withdrawn from society by severe afflictions, that in 
love to the Church as well as in gratitude to the 
Saviour whose grace made him what he was, it now 
seems to be the duty of some one who knew him to 
show the world how he lived and died. 

He was born in the year 1792, in the Wiltshire 
village of Damerham, where his father was a car- 
penter. Looking back, through many years, to his 
first impressions of existence, he could recall with 
keen distinctness some tender words of his sister 
while nursing him ; the charm which certain sights 
in nature had for him \ the unspeakable love which 
he felt for a child of his own age, who was a little 
after his companion in wild, playful, daring mis- 
chief; the rapture with which he spelt his way 
through some poems and romances contained in two 
ancient black-letter volumes, almost the first books 
he ever saw. " Those days," he used to say, " are 
still quite a scene of light in my memory. I often 
find it very pleasant to revive the faded and beau- 
tiful images of my childhood, the May-flowers of my 
spirit, and can sometimes make them almost as 
fresh and simple as they were at first." 

This, however, was not his " golden age," and 
sorrow even then shed the prevailing colour over his 
life. Let us hear his own account : — 

"My sorrows began early. I clearly recollect the 
season of dreadful scarcity in 1705, when I was three years 
old, and the hunger I often felt. At seven years old I 
went to work, and toiled through a variety of rural em- 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 6 

ployments till I was twelve, when I began at my father's 
business. My home was a home of misery which I have 
never seen equalled. Want in every shape, turbulence, 
sleepless nights, a broken-hearted mother, full of weeping 
tenderness ; what a melancholy picture could I give you ! 
all caused by the prodigality and intemperance of my 

poor father All this time I had an affecting 

sense of the awful and alarming in religion, with a strong 
propensity to muse on the future, but I had no conception 
of a Saviour ; and when I used to tell these feelings to my 
mother, she very lovingly encouraged them, but knew not 
how to direct me. " 

If he felt a peculiar interest, as he did, in calling 
to mind his earliest experiences, it must indeed have 
been in the spirit of Southey, who says, 

' ' Yet is remembrance sweet, though well I know 
The days of childhood are but days of woe. " 

During the next six years, rough labour shattered 
his health ; grave cares acting on a mind that was 
delicately balanced so disordered it, that he fre- 
quently passed through "months of unspeakable 
horror," and was never after free from a melancholy 
cast of thought. Worst of all, his religious feelings 
melted away. Thrown amongst companions of the 
worst description, he was by them frequently urged 
and charmed to the brink of utter ruin * and though 
drawn back from this by an invisible hand, and 
saved from those sins of the senses by which his 
companions were lost, these were years of mental sin 
which he always trembled to remember : — 



4 POWEB IN WEAKNESS : 

" Yet," said he, "it is a sad comfort that I have not to 
reproach myself with neglecting the means of religion, for 
I never knew any : and God, in His adorable wisdom, has 
turned this sad part of my existence into good for me, by 
making the recollection of it enhance the sense of obligation 
to my Redeemer ; giving a deeper sweetness to His mercy, 
and making me feel that it will excite through all the days 
of heaven a more vivid admiration of His love than if my 
whole life had been devoted to His service." 

In the autumn of 1811, he was led by the duties 
of his employment to reside for a few weeks at 
Bingwood. This was to be his second birth-place — 
the scene of the grand change in his spiritual his- 
tory. We know that there is an almost infinite 
variety in the instrumental methods by which this 
change is effected in men. " When the palm of 
Zeilan puts forth its blossom, the sheath breaks 
with a report which startles the forest ; but at the 
same moment millions of surrounding blossoms are 
opening in silence." * Some hearts open to God 
suddenly, some slowly ; in some cases the external 
means are violent as the earthquake which shook open 
the prison at Philippi ; in others, they are gentle as 
the morning light upon the flower ; but how rarely 
do we hear of the Spirit converting a soul without 
external agencies of some kind ! So it seemed to 
be, however, in the present case. It is true, that 
now for the first time in his life, William Rhodes 
met with a person who sought to do him spiritual 
good, but this attempt only exasperated his unbelief, 

* Mr. Spurgeon's "The Saint and his Saviour." 



ME3I0KIALS OF THE KEY. W. EHODES. O 

and lie told the kind evangelist that his principles 
were only fancies, deserving to be held in utter con- 
tempt, and that he himself would never embrace 
them while he retained his reason. He always 
thought his conversion was by a kind of mental 
miracle, a change effected by God as the sole in- 
strument, as well as the sole power. 

The following extract from a letter to a friend in 
September, 1824, gives his own narrative of the 
circumstance : — 

1 ' It is thirteen years on the second Wednesday of this 

month, since I became a Christian On that 

Wednesday night, poor Henry again conversed with me on 
religions topics, and invited me to go with him to meeting 
on the morrow evening ; I was touched by his kindness, 
but felt utter distaste and contempt for his piety. I would 
not promise to go when we parted ; I mused upon it, and 
determined never to go. In this temper I went to sleep. 
This proved a memorable night to me. The moment I 
opened my eyes in the morning, I felt nryself a new being. 
A fresh set of sentiments and feelings rushed into my mind 
and perfectly amazed me. Iso language I have at command 
will fully convey to you what I felt. All things appeared 
to me in a new light ; I felt most vividly concerned, dis- 
tressed, alarmed about my soul and G-od. The deep things 
of religion gleamed through the ignorance of my mind in 
dim, misty, fearful colours. All the feelings of dislike for 
Henry and his religion when I closed my eyes in sleep were 
now completely gone, and I felt an inexpressible longing to 
be religious. I felt as if I had been placed in a new world 
in clouded moonlight ; all was new, strange, and appalling ; 
yet nothing distinctly seen. As I looked back on the dis- 
mal past, all my life appeared utter vanity and sin. This 
continued all the day ; that was indeed a day of solemn and 



6 POWER IN WEAKNESS ! 

awful musing, of solemn and awful emotion. Religion, 
though I did not understand its nature nor how to seek it 
— religion and eternity filled every moment of thought, and 
appeared to me to be simply and sublimely my all. I 
determined to become a real Christian, whatever that might 
be ; to renounce everything that might hinder, and attend 
to everything that might assist me in the blessed attain- 
ment. I felt that I had all to learn, all to feel, and all to 
do for the salvation of my soul. 

1 ' In a day or two the troubled amazement of my spirit 
considerably subsided, my views became more clear and 
defined, I perceived the nature of what was working within 
me, and felt sure that a new life of thought and feeling had 
commenced. I longed for pardon ; the way of mercy 
through a Saviour began to open before me with indistinct 
but delightful freshness. Oh ! what divine rest and beauty 
I soon felt and saw in the simple plan of salvation through 
His death ! The following Saturday I learnt a hymn, the 
first I ever learnt, and entered fully into its affecting 
import : — 

' And now the scales have left mine eyes, 
Now I begin to see.' 

A spirit of prayer was poured upon me, and on my way 
home in the dark, I, who had never prayed without a form, 
prayed for an hour in my own language, from the fulness of 
my heart." 

Such is his own report of the strange fact. The 
mere student of mind and its phenomena may be 
disposed to regard it with sceptical surprise. Per- 
haps indeed, the fact, though strange, was not so un- 
accountable as he supposed. Perhaps in the course 
of some interview with his friend, when his mind 
was in a state of angry confusion or scornful in- 
difference \ when it was not listening, when it was 



MEMORIALS OF THE KEV. W. RHODES. 7 

not taking in the full meaning of what was addressed 
to it ; some divine truth spoken by " Poor Henry " 
found a silent lodgment there, scarcely noticed at 
the time and soon forgotten ; and then in that 
solemn hour when the Spirit was at work within 
him, this truth was one of the powers employed 
to alarm his conscience into life, and melt his spirit 
into penitence. Whatever may be the true expla- 
nation of the mystery, it is certain that from that 
memorable night he appeared to be a new being. 
He once assured a friend that his happy confidence 
in being saved never had an hour's disturbance from 
this time. Before it his life was one of darkness ; 
after it, his path, though sometimes chequered and 
stormy, was the path of the just, shining more and 
more unto the perfect day. 



CHAPTER II. 

' ' I look towards that holy place 
Where sinners find a throne of grace, 

And there I fix mine eyes. 
My vows unto the Lord I'll pay, 
And there upon his altar lay 
My willing sacrifice." 

Lewis Way. 



DEDICATION TO THE SERVICE OF GOD. STUDENT- 
LIFE AT BRISTOL AND EDINBURGH. 

Eight months after the change, the history of 
which has jnst been related, the young convert was 
baptized at Salisbury by the Rev. J. Saffery, then 
and for many years the esteemed pastor of a church 
there. As he lived eighteen miles away, he had 
been received as a candidate for baptism on the 
credit of the village preachers, and his first interview 
with Mr. Saffery was in the half hour before service. 
The substance of what passed may be learned from 
one of his papers : — 

' ' After I had been conducted into the way of peace by a 
blessed and celestial hand, the service of God became my 



MEMORIALS OP THE REV. W. RHODES. | V 

whole delight. I set myself to acquire religious knowledge 
with intense avidity. The New Testament I read through 
in about a week, and almost every page was a page of light 
and beauty to my mind, so that my views of divine things 
almost daily grew larger and brighter. At first I mixed 
with the Methodists, and was united to their society ; but 
did not continue with them long ; I loved them for their 
simplicity and affection, but could not accept some of their 
sentiments. My own experience made me a Calvinist ; the 
leading principle of this system was verified in my own 
mind to the life. I did not become a Christian by my own 
effort, but by the free bounty and choice of God." 

Writing to Dr. Byland respecting this interview, 
Mr. Saffery says : — 

1 ' I was pleased with the piety of the young man, and 
particularly struck with his correct views of divine truth, 
considering that he had been religiously impressed but a 
few months. Persuaded that he must have read more than 
the generality of professors, I questioned him respecting it, 
and received for answer that he had read about fifty trea- 
tises ! Some of these, I suppose, were small ; but as he 
had to labour hard every day, it surprised me. It appeared, 
too, that his divinity reading had been of the best kind. 
He had read all that he could buy or borrow, taking daily 
six hours for sleep, and eighteen for work, reading, and 
devotional exercises." 

With all the ardour of his new life, he now be- 
came a preacher ; and frequently, after a week spent 
in the toils which have just been described, he 
would walk twenty-four miles, and preach twice in 
the course of Sunday. " God is preparing another 
labourer for the harvest," said Mr. Saffery ; and in 
the year 1813, by his recommendation, connected 



10 POWER m weakness : 

with that of Mr. Bishop, the Independent minister 
at Ringwood, he was admitted as a student in the 
Bristo] College. 

While at Bristol, he displayed no remarkable 
aptitude for the acquisition of languages. Yet he 
there laid the foundation of the rare excellence he 
afterwards attained as a Biblical scholar. From 
that time to the end of his life, he read the Hebrew 
and Greek Scriptures daily, and sometimes almost 
exclusively. The Scripture quotations which abound 
in his papers are nearly all his own renderings from 
the original. Hundreds of them bear witness to 
the minute and cautious exactitude of study by 
which he sought to mark every slight emphasis and 
every delicate inflection of meaning in the processes 
of inspired thought. 

About this period, Mr. Foster's frequent visits 
to Bristol led to the honour of an intimacy with 
him, which was only interrupted by death. The 
most interesting circumstances of his Bristol his- 
tory, however, were those by which he became 
acquainted with Dr. Stock, a gentleman who was 
then widely known for the charm of his society, 
as well as for his high scientific attainments. 
Unhappily he was a Socinian, but through the in- 
strumentality, first of Mr. Yernon, of Downend, 
and subordinately of Mr. Rhodes, who was fre- 
quently his patient, he was led to embrace "the 
truth as it is in Jesus." An extract from a letter 
on this subject, addressed by Mr. Rhodes to his 



MEMOEIALS OF THE KEV. W. KHODES. 11 

valued friend, Mr. J. E. Byland, will be read with 
interest : — 

"Bristol, December IQth, 1816. 
"You have been informed, I suppose, of Dr. Stock's 
most satisfactory conversion from Socinianism and sin to 
true piety. A short time before this gentleman first visited 
me, he had some conversation with Mr. Vernon on the 
Socinian creed, which induced him to think seriously on 
the subject and to examine it afresh. He had not proceeded 
far in reading the New Testament, before light broke in 
upon his mind. This was about the time when he held the 
long and very serious conversation with me of which I told 
you. Soon after this, Mr. Vernon lent him the sermons of 
Chalmers, which you brought home. The last of these 

produced a wonderful change in his mind It 

led him to see that all his past religion had been a mere 
matter of form and taste ; and it gave him those views of 
the spiritual obedience which God demands, and of the evil 
of sin, which convinced him of the necessity of the atone- 
ment, and the Divinity of the Saviour, together with 

a universal change of heart I have had, and 

still continue to have, with him the most delightful and 
animating conversations that I have ever enjoyed. ISTever 
before have T seen so full and complete a victory of truth. 
Its full sunshine and radiance seem to have entered his 
mind" 

What a suggestive instance was here afforded of 
the great work that may be wrought, even in the 
most sequestered Christian life, simply by conversa- 
tion ! " Death and life are in the power of the 
tongue." Issues of infinite good may now from an 
ordinary social interview. 

In 1817, assisted by the generosity of a friend, 



12 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

Mr. Rhodes proceeded to Edinburgh, where he 
continued his studies with great assiduity and cor- 
responding success. He was already prepared to 
be an enthusiast in the science of mind. " I had 
always," said he, " a keen relish for metaphysics, 
and delighted to make my own mind my constant 
home." It was to him, therefore, a most welcome 
circumstance that Dr. Thomas Brown occupied the 
chair of Moral Philosophy, and was in the very 
midst of his brilliant career. Every one must have 
heard of his great and peculiar powers ; and it is 
easy to imagine what effects they would have on 
the receptive mind of his new disciple. To the end 
of his days he was accustomed to speak of his great 
obligations to this teacher, whose work on " Cause 
and Effect " he read through once every year, 
although he gradually qualified his approval of 
some of the philosophical doctrines there expressed. 
Perhaps, much as he admired Dr. Brown, the 
influence he exerted on his mind was not in all 
respects favourable. Dr. Gregory has described 
Brown's poetry as too philosophical, and his philo- 
sophy as too poetical. His great defect was in his 
manner. It was strongly marked by what seemed 
to be affectation — the affectation of nice discrimi- 
nation, fine feeling, and pensive reflection.* Mr. 
Rhodes, like most of his companions, was so fasci- 
nated by the professor's rich thoughts, liquid and 
musical diction, and passionate eloquence, that he 

* Lord Cockburu's Memorials of his Time. 



MEMOETALS OF THE EEV. W. KHODES. 13 

saw not that " want of perfect simplicity of man- 
ner," which is now universally allowed to be the 
fault of these delightful lectures ; and the conse- 
quence was, that his own style caught the infection, 
and he became an unconscious imitator of his 
master's defects. 

Writing to the Rev. James Jones, one of his 
former companions at Bristol, he thus describes his 
first impressions of Dr. Brown, and at the same 
time opens a glimpse of his own spiritual life at 
the time he was entering this new sphere of 
study : — 

"Edinburgh, December 23rd, 1817. 
' ' The professor of moral philosophy is a man of whom we 
may well be proud. I think him greatly superior to Stewart, 
whom he succeeded. His lectures embrace a very high and 
wide range of the richest intelligence ; and though he 
labours in a field which has been occupied by many of the 
greatest and brightest minds that have ever visited our 
globe, yet every day he brings forward much that is original 
and splendid. He is particularly distinguished for the beau- 
tiful simplicity of his views. It is a great advantage to me 
now that I have long been, to some extent, acquainted with 
the masters of English and Scottish philosophical thought, 
as I have been thus prepared for attending him. With all 
his greatness he is exceedingly winning and amiable ; I have 
jpent one evening with him already, and have a cordial in- 
Titation to visit him whenever I please, for conversation on 
ihe subjects of his lectures. When he comes to the moral 
part of his course, I intend to talk with him often ; and 
shall endeavour, if possible, to say something in favour of 
the book and the religion we love. Poor man ! with all his 
power and elegance of mind he is completely ignorant of 
the spiritual character of Christianity, if not actually an 



14 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

infidel rejecter of its heavenly claims. Indeed, I fear he 
has scarcely any settled sentiments whatever on the religion 
of Christ, although he has great faith in the moral dignity 
and worth of human nature. 

" I ardently long to be engaged in the service of our 
blessed Redeemer ..... My mind is constantly 
turning away from its most favourite intellectual pursuits, 
feeling that even they are dry and insipid in comparison 
with divine things What a cause for unceas- 
ing felicity, that all our being now belongs to the Redeemer ! 
Nothing affords me such sweet and refreshing delight as the 
thought that there never will be an hour in my existence 
in which I shall not be His ; serving Him, seeing Him, 
and growing in conformity to His pure and infinite ex- 
cellence." 

Mr. Rhodes was soon admitted to the privilege 
of intimacy with the Doctor. The following letter 
to Mr. J. E. R.ylancl is interesting, as a memorial 
of this fact, as well as for its own intrinsic 
value : — 

"Edinburgh, March 23rd, 1818. 

" Dr. Brown returned Hall's sermon* to me to-day. He 
says there are many fine things in it, though at the same 
time it is much confused, so that in reading it you cannot 
tell whereabouts you are. However, it is what he should 
have expected from an off-hand effort of its very eloquent 
author. He says Hall has been reading his most favourite 
book, ' The Night Thoughts, ' which in his opinion abounds 
in solemn, fervent sentiments, and heavenly imagery. He 
very much wishes Hall had dwelt more on the nothing- 
ness of royal greatness. He cannot sympathise with the 
almost adoration which is paid to the memory of the prin- 
cess ; though he is very loyal, and though, no doubt, she 



* On the Death of the Princess Charlotte. 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 15 

was a pretty good young woman, yet he certainly hopes 
Mr. Hall has five hundred (!) as good and indeed much 
better in his own congregation. 

" 1 have spent three or four hours with him since I wrote 
to you last. We took much time in conversing on Hall's idea 
of virtue in his sermon on ' Modern Infidelity. ' But really 
he has quite overcome me. The view Hall has there given 

is the very perfection of the selfish system 

However, I have brought Dr. Brown to acknowledge that 
Hall has contradicted this sermon in his Fast Sermon. I 
have also introduced to him Edwards's 'Dissertation on 
the Nature of Virtue, ' which he very much admires . 

"Brown is strongly inclined to publish his Lectures on 
Morals. He delivered to-day his first Lecture on the De- 
sires. I am more and more pleased with the simplicity and 
beauty, and, at the same time, the comprehensiveness of 
the plan. He perfectly agrees with Edwards respecting the 
Will. He made many beautiful and affecting remarks to- 
day on the fatal propensity of human minds to choose what 
is not morally good. While talking with him afterwards, 
I asked him why he did not say something to explain why 
the mind chose that which was evil — what is the reason 
of it ? ' Ah ! ' said he, ' that is a deep and awful question, 
and I must come to you for that, ' meaning that the Bible 
alone can tell. * Now, ' said he, ' do you not think it is 
better I should bring forward all that Reason can utter, 
quite distinct from the views of the Bible, and the more we 
see how little it can tell us, the more we shall see our need 
of the Bible? And yet moral philosophy ought to be 
identified with the doctrines of revelation ; there must be 
a full harmony between them. ' I said, ' I thought this was 
very right ; I only wished that his science should not 
oppose Christianity in any point, nor give us to think for a 
moment that all its merciful provisions were not wanted in 
addition to all that philosophy can teach. ' I fear, my dear 
friend, that I shall weary you in talking about this great 
and most lovely man. " 



16 POWER IN weakness: 

" The freedom to which the Doctor admits Mr. 
Rhodes," remarked Robert Hall about this time, 
"is in itself a proof of the distinguished merit of 
that gentleman." The illustration of this intimacy 
supplied by this letter alone, would justify a 
similar inference. It was not, however, only on 
account of the honour reflected upon himself by 
such a friendship, or the intellectual advantages 
he derived from it, that he loved to cherish its 
memory in after years, but also from the hope 
that it was not without spiritual benefit to his 
illustrious friend. Dr. Brown was always accus- 
tomed to speak respectfully of the Christian 
Revelation • but he had never accepted the dis- 
tinguishing tenets of the evangelical system. He 
was charmed with the poetry, the beautiful senti- 
ment, and the earnest enthusiasms of the Christian 
life ; but he thought these results might be ob- 
tained simply by following out man's natural ten- 
dencies. The very terms on which he received 
Christianity amounted to little more than a polite 
and complimentary rejection of it. His own creed 
was too obscure and indefinite to render him the 
highest practical service. It had no power to 
inspire " a song in the night," or to sustain in the 
hour of trial. That hour he now felt to be ap- 
proaching. His health was in a languid state, and 
the thought of death threw a shade over the sun- 
shine of his gay and gentle spirit. Open as the 
day ; simple as a child ; he could not conceal from 
his confidential friends the sad misgivings of his 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 17 

heart. More than once, Mr. Rhodes heard him 
recite with startling pathos some lines from Beattie's 
"Hermit," which he applied with evident reference 
to himself : — 

" 'Tis night, and the landscape is lovely no more : 

I mourn, but, ye woodlands, I mourn not for you ; 
For morn is approaching, your charms to restore, 

Perfumed with fresh fragrance and glittering with dew : 
Nor yet for the ravage of winter I mourn ; 

Kind Nature the embryo blossom will save. 
But when shall spring visit the mouldering urn ? 

Oh ! when shall it dawn on the night of the grave ? " 

He numbered amongst his friends many eminent 
ministers in Edinburgh, but all were so awed by 
his genius, or so unwilling to encounter him in the 
keen exercise of the logical and critical faculties, 
which a challenge to religious conversation would 
involve, that they could not call up courage to 
speak to him on the great solemnities of their 
faith. The humble student, however, resolved to 
make the venture, and he did make it frequently. 
Once he led him into conversation on the Epistle 
to the Romans ; on another occasion he persuaded 
him to read Fuller's "Gospel its own Witness ; " 
and on the morning of the day when he took his 
final departure from the university, wmile the 
Doctor was walking arm in arm with him in the 
college grounds, he once more respectfully intro- 
duced the theme, begging him to reconsider it, and 
requesting him, as a favour to himself, to read two 

c 



18 POWER IN WEAKNESS. 

books : one of these was Dr. « Pye Smith on the 
" Sacrifice and Priesthood of Christ ; " and the 
other, Poster's " Essay on the Aversion of Men 
of Taste to Evangelical Religion." Dr. Brown 
thanked him and said, " I honour and admire your 
fidelity." In the course of the next year the philo- 
sopher died. Perhaps the farewell words of his 
young friend were seeds of immortal life in his 
spirit, and may be even now bringing forth fruit in 
that world which we must die to see. 



CHAPTER III. 

" When first thou didst entice me to thy heart, 

I had my wish and way : 
My days were strew'd with flowers and happiness ; 

There was no month but May. 
But with my years sorrow did twist and grow, 
And made a party unawares for woe. " 

George Herbert. 



DISAPPOINTMENT. 

Edinburgh had been to Mr. Rhodes a scene of 
great happiness. His mind while there had opened 
in a congenial atmosphere. Like most persons who 
suffer from a frail and sickly physical system, he 
had ever before been accustomed to fear society, and 
to shrink from contact with the " insolence of 
health ; " but he formed associations in this place 
which tended to thaw the frost of his reserve, and 
disperse the native melancholy of his spirit. Writ- 
ing of this to his friend D. Alexander, Esq., he 
said : — 



20 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

" I felt the freshness and delight of existence as I had 
never felt it before. There was quite a spring in my heart. 
All things around me wore a face of gladness. A green 
leaf, an opening bud, a flower, a bird, seemed now to have 
a new and living beauty. Voices of happiness came from 
every quarter. I felt as if amidst a magnificent chorus of 
hopes and joys." 

Those who best understood him knew that al- 
though these sounded like high-flown sentiments, 
they were the true utterances of his heart ; and 
none were surprised. They seemed to be warranted 
not only by his experiences, but by his prospects. 
Everything was rich with hope, and bright with 
promise. He had naturally a fervid ambition ; this 
ambition had been sanctified, and it seemed likely 
soon to be honoured by the successes he was about 
to achieve in the service of his Redeemer. Such, 
therefore, were his own feelings and those of his 
friends when, in 1819, he ended his academical 
course and went forth on the grand errand of his 
life. 

" Oh thou Boanerges, one of my stout and thun- 
dering captains, over one ten thousand of my valiant 
and faithful servants, go thou in my name, with 
this thy force, to the miserable town of Mansoul ! " 
These, according to John Bunyan, are the opening 
terms of the commission with which the great king 
Shaddai sends forth each faithful proclaimer of his 
gospel. William Rhodes scarcely answered to this 
description. He never had been a " son of thunder," 
and a succession of afflictions by which he was 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 21 

visited shortly after leaving Edinburgh so weakened 
him, that congregations were disposed to think they 
had never before seen in the rostrum such a slender 
form, or heard from it such a thin, thrilling voice. 
Poor man ! wherever he went, he was haunted with 
fears of not making himself heard ; and grave men, 
holding a formidable apparatus to assist hearing, 
would frequently stand on the upper stairs of the 
pulpit, thereby filling his heart with dismay. To 
use Robert Robinson's expression, he " had wisdom 
- — that is, something to say : but lacked mouth — 
that is, power to say it." His other qualifications 
for the ministry were manifestly of the first class ; 
and sometimes, at this early period of his ministerial 
life, during the intervals of comparative health, his 
deficiency, even in this respect, was not so remark- 
able as to prevent him from being an effective 
preacher, especially when before a refined and 
thoughtful audience. Persons still remember a ser- 
mon which he preached at Devizes about this time, 
and how sentence after sentence was heard with 
shiver after shiver of solemn delight. " Had he 
been endowed with a moderate voice," writes a 
gentleman who knew him well, " he would doubt- 
less have exerted a wide influence upon the mass." 
But Mr. Rhodes was forced to say, " My voice has 
ever resisted and mortified my aspiration to be a 
preacher." The evil became worse and worse ; and 
at length, while still a young man, he found it un- 
wise ever to attempt preaching, except in the little 
meeting-house of some village. His ministerial 



22 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

prospects got more forlorn every month ; but in the 
winter of 1821, just when all hope was on the point 
of extinction, he received an invitation to be pastor 
of a church in the village of Sherneld, in Hamp- 
shire. 

"Can you believe it, my dear Mrs. Saffery," so he wrote, 
"the people of Sherfield wish me to stay ! This is certainly 
a most rare and auspicious thing for me, — for me who have 
long expected that ' a call ' would come from the third 
heavens, before I should receive a call to be pastor in any 
place under the sun. Thus at last a scene of labour is found 
for me if I choose to accept it, and exactly the same mea- 
sure of opulence is placed within my reach, as is enjoyed by 
some of the ministers of our beloved church, — for I am to 
be 'full passing rich with forty pounds a year.' . . 
Well, though here is not everything that I could desire, I 
do indeed bless God with all my heart, and affectionately 
thank Mr. Saffery for bringing me hither. ... I trust 
there is important work for me to do, and that power will 
be given me to do it. In some respects I have misgivings, 
for many of the people are ultra- Calvinists ; they will not 
think, they will not work, their souls have retired to rest and 
drawn the curtains. Already some of them complain of me 
for disturbing their slumbers, by trying to let in a little 
daylight upon them, and showing them the scene of duty. " 

At the request of this church, he consented to 
settle here as pastor. But to a greater extent than 
he was at first aware, the people were infected with 
Antinomian fancies, were very ignorant, very vain, 
and very repulsive in temper. It was a sore trial 
to the sensitive student to exchange the cultivated 
society of Edinburgh for that of such men as 
" James Hedger, William Small, and Mr. Ardphist;" 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 23 

men who had little faith in his wisdom, great faith 
in their own ; men who were far more remarkable 
for their attachment to the doctrine of election than 
to that of charity ; who despised scholarship, and 
who thought that ministers should be in this 
respect like the apostle Paul, " who," thought they, 
"never troubled himself about Greek, but, as we 
may see, wrote the Epistles in plain, home-spun 
English." 

It was not his happiness to effect much good to 
these worthies. He tried to " enchant them out of 
their indolence," "but they would not hear the 
voice of the charmer." He tried to convince them 
of their errors, but their only arguments were 
angry strokes of personality. 

' ' Oh why were farmers made so coarse, 
Or clergy made so fine ? 
A kick that scarce would move a horse 
May kill a sound divine." 

Unable to bear the rough wrestling of a life like 
this, before the expiration of six months he resigned 
his charge. 

Yet the six months spent in this unpromising 
sphere were not lost. His trials were of great 
benefit to his own spirit. They led him to a new 
and more complete investigation of the Scriptures, 
and the effect of this upon himself was most im- 
portant and delightful. _ It was brought about in a 
way which he thus describes : — 



24 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

"You can imagine that it was no slight affliction to me 
to be placed among such people. They found fault with 
everything that came from my lips, and counted me quite 
in the dark. Yet I was never angry with them for a 
moment, — I loved and pitied them with all my heart, and 
longed to do them good. Trying as my post was, I shall 
never cease to be thankful to my Saviour for placing me in 
it, for it was an occasion of unspeakable benefit to my own 
spirit. This unhappy temper of theirs induced me to pay 
the most rigid attention to the very letter of Scripture, lest 
I should advance any shade of sentiment that could not be 
sustained by its sacred authority. My reverential impres- 
sions of the inspired Word, as the only standard of truth, 
were thereby much deepened. As I thus went on for some 
time searching the Scriptures and praying for the Spirit, 
that I might imbibe the very sentiments and feelings of the 
Divine Being, and receive every part of religion simple and 
fresh as it came from heaven, the New Testament seemed 
to wear an aspect of novelty to me, the mist which had 
hitherto veiled some of its doctrines now cleared away. 
I perceived truths which surprised me, and there was a 
beautiful tenderness shed over its pages which seemed 
perfectly new and enchanting." 

While engaged in this process of inquiry, he wrote 
some interesting letters, from which the following 
passages are extracted. They were addressed to 
J. E. Byland, Esq., M.A. :— 

ON THE METAPHYSICAL STUDY OF RELIGION. 

"How much mischief has been done, and is still doing, 
by bringing forward the metapky&ics of religion too promi- 
nently. The representations of certain truths in the New 
Testament are vastly different from the representations of 
the same truths in the writings of Edwards. No doubt the 
books are suited to do much good, but they should not be 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 25 

read by any person till he has attained some power of 
independent thinking and is well settled in his religions 
views. If he reads these works at the commencement of 
his pions inquiries, he is sure to be entangled, and will feel 
himself caught in metaphysical springs and gins at every 
step ; — he will find his spirit brought into bondage by those 
very subjects which would have filled it with freedom and 
light if he had studied them simply from the Word of God. 
I do not love this theology. It is wanting in the sweetness and 
compassion, in the dignity and grandeur, which are mingled 
with the theology of the Saviour and His inspired apostles. 
The elements of it are true, but they are stripped of their 
celestial colouring and freshness ; and some Divine truths, 
which in the Word of God are covered with tenderness and 
love, are presented in these "writings with an aspect of iron 
and steel. 

" I think no works of religious controversy should be read 
by young persons in general, nor in the earlier stages of piety. 
Even Fuller's works may do a great deal of harm. They 
may do more injury to the temper, in repressing modesty 
and humility in religious inquiry, than they will do good by 
the clear views they impart. They inspire a tone of decided 
conviction respecting controverted subjects, which no young 
man should ever indidge, and which mere reading should 
never excite. The great mischief in all controversy is, that 
the confidence of the writer, which perhaps has been many 
years in coming to maturity, and may be well founded, is 
communicated to the reader in a few hours, without any 
more thought than mere reading demands. I am ashamed 
to think on the confidence I have felt on several topics, 
inspired by the reading of a few days or weeks, but which 
ought not to have been felt without the examination and 
serious thought of years." 

ON THE PRACTICAL USES OF RELIGIOUS TRUTH. 

"I have lately endeavoured to converse with several 
Christian persons about the devout influence of sacred 



26 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

truth on the mind, but I found them quite unaccustomed 
to this kind of thought. They cordially believe the Atone- 
ment, for instance, but they do nothing with it besides 
believing it. It seems to be in their minds like a statue in 
a workshop. It is a mere dead sentiment which does 
nothing. They do not try to make it exert its practical 
energy to govern and console them. In my view, an 
inconsequential assent to the doctrines of the Gospel is 
equivalent to utter disbelief. The great secret of being a 
Christian is to get Divine truths to work in the soul, and 
this is to be done not only by believing them, and reflect- 
ing on them, but by applying them to the various spiritual 
disorders and evils to which we feel ourselves subject. We 
should use up all our religious convictions, and embody our 
faith in our practice. I examine in the Word of God what 
particular effect is ascribed to any particular doctrine, and 
then by all the efforts of prayer and meditation try to let 
this doctrine have this effect on me. Paul says, ' By the 
cross of Christ, the world is crucified unto me, and I unto 
the world. ' Now I am endeavouring to make the death of 
the Saviour do the same thing for me — to raise me above 
the world, and to make me regard the world as a dead and 
insignificant thing." 

ON FREEDOM FROM HUMAN AUTHORITY IN MATTERS OF 
RELIGIOUS BELIEF. 

" Till I became acquainted with Dr. Brown, I was in 
bondage to the opinions of men and the sentiments I found 
in books. He taught me by his keen and severe questions 
on religious subjects to strip off the covering of words, and 
to look at the subjects themselves. He did much to bring 
me out of that house of theological bondage in which I was 
long a slave, and now I exult in the feelings of a freeman. 
The only way to enjoy this liberty is to pay no solemn and 
absolute deference to the authority of men, and to feel no 
danger in transgressing it. While I relied on their state- 
ments of sacred things, I trembled at the thought of moving 



MEMORIALS OF THE EEV. W. RHODES. 27 

out of the circle they had drawn round me ; but now I can 
go out of any such circle with which I am acquainted, and 
wander far abroad without fear. I am determined that my 
soul shall never be confined again in any system of things 
which man has formed. It shall reside amidst the beautiful 
economy of Truth which God has unfolded, in the mansion 
of light which, like the mystic Jerusalem seen by the 
prophet, has ' come down from God out of heaven. ' In 
reading the New Testament, I feel myself in a region of 
daylight and love, and I aim to exert the same unlimited 
freedom of thought as if the book had just descended, and 
no mortal eye had seen it before. The fear of transgressing 
the boundaries of received opinions in religion is the greatest 
impediment in the way of our gaining satisfactory know- 
ledge of Divine truth. It tempts us to pay more attention 
to the authority of man than to the authority of God. The 
right feeling evidently is, that God has given us His Word 
for our sole authoritative instruction ; we are bound to read 
- it with devout seriousness, and we are accountable to Him 
alone for the views we derive from it. Let us not silently 
repress the doubts which arise, but try to meet them man- 
fully with the solid arguments and truths which the book 
from heaven affords. In the great and mysterious economy 
which embraces all the sublime interests of the soul, and 
the concerns of eternity, we must expect to meet with many 
difficulties ; we shall often be in darkness, but the holy 
brightness of truth will gradually shine upon us, and lead us 
to the land of rest. " 



ON THE SAME SUBJECT. 

"I do feel a profound obligation and desire to view every 
Divine truth just as God has unfolded it. But while search- 
ing after it with these wishes and desires, I am often afraid 
lest some beautiful particles of the celestial ore may be lost 
in separating it from the earthly substance with which it is 
so firmly combined. Some of the precious essence may 



28 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

evaporate in the very act of its being analysed. There is a 
danger of throwing away some of the incorruptible seed 
along with the chaff. I regard the New Testament as a 
fine picture which is covered with the accumulated dust of 
ages ; and in removing the dust, though it may be done 
with a most careful and tender hand, is there no danger of 
hurting the colours and impairing the perfect beauty which 
lies beneath it ? However, one must not be too much 
alarmed at this danger, as it is better to see if it were only 
one half of the picture in its original loveliness, than to look 
at the whole disfigured and beclouded with cobwebs and 
dust." 

THE ATONEMENT. 

' ' I think, with all humility and deference, that the 
teachings respecting the Atonement given by Edwards and 
Fuller are eminently wrong in several respects. They are 
too general and speculative for common minds and common 
use. Even if they are true, they are much better suited to 
the wide contemplations and great angelic faculties of 
heavenly spirits, who have no need of the Atonement, and 
who can afford time for such high speculations, than they 
are to us weak, dark -minded, perishing mortals, to whom 
this Divine remedy is only presented that we may seize it 
for our one hope and consolation. These writers hardly 
ever bring forward the Atonement without directing our 
chief attention to what they regard as the ultimate basis on 
which it is founded. They will hardly venture to invite 
their perishing fellow-mortals into this refuge of peace and 
safety, till by infinite delving and toiling they have removed 
loads of earth and dust, that we may first look at the founda- 
tion on which the refuge stands. It is enough for us to 
know that God has erected it, and that we are welcome to 
enter it ; and this, I think, is all we can understand re- 
specting it. These teachers are always dwelling on the 
abstract and distant relations which the sacrifice of Christ 
sustains to the moral government of God; aud for several 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 29 

years I have been striving to obtain some firm and denned 
conception of these relations, bnt I have now given np 
this toil, and am become qnite content to resolve the 
whole worth and efficacy of this sacrifice into the will of 
God. Edwards and Fuller may find such speculations 
suited to the elevation and grandeur of their own minds, 
but it is a pity they have not perceived them to be nothing 
more than speculations. They once led me to imagine that 
I could know much more about this great subject than is 
revealed in the Bible. My attention was taken off from 
what is clearly stated there, and fixed on something which 
is unattainable, or at all events of very little practical 
importance if it could be attained. I shall have these vain 
imaginations no more." 

Through coming afresh to the sources of truth, 
and " reading the book as if it had just descended, 
and no mortal had seen it before," the inquirer de- 
rived a great enlargement and confirmation of his 
faith. Devout as he was, even he had found a ten- 
dency in the atmosphere of a college to chill the life 
of piety, and from various influences his faith had 
been in great danger. Delighting to think about 
thought, and naturally inclined to study the philo- 
sophical rather than the practical side of revealed 
truth, he had gradually become much perplexed. 
The mysteries of religion, especially the mysteries 
connected with the revelation of our Saviour's 
nature, were suffered to have an undue ascendency 
over his mind. " Subtle doubts, not touched upon 
in books," would sometimes fill him with distress ; 
and though he still believed, there were moments 
when he believed with difficulty. This was his 
state of mind when he commenced this new scrip- 



30 POWEK IN WEAKNESS : 

tural inquiry. As he advanced, his doubts for a 
time seemed to multiply ; but he faced them, ques- 
tioned them, prayed over them, and brought them 
to the test of inspiration. At length he could say, 
when writing to his friend, the Rev. Thomas 
Horton : " You will rejoice to hear that, after 
agonies of deep perplexity and serious examination 
respecting the nature of our blessed Saviour, I have 
been brought to the happy and decided conclusion 
that he is truly Divine." Henceforth his life illus- 
trated the truth of ISTeander's sentence — " The faith 
which has faced difficulties is a far higher faith than 
that which studiously ignores them." 

These were not the only difficult lessons of the 
Christian life that he learnt in this humble school. 
Writing of Sherfield, he says : — 

"While I was at this place, an incident occurred which, 
although slight and common in itself, had another most 
important effect on my spiritual life. One of my hearers 
had aspersed the character of another. In reproving her 
for it, I referred to the import and obligation of the second 
commandment, which she had violated. While I was thus 
speaking, a vivid and piercing conviction flashed upon me 
that I myself had been violating this sacred law ever since 
I had been a Christian. I have no words to express the 
intense shame and penitence which this conviction produced. 
My numerous violations of this sovereign law were recalled 
to my mind with alarming brightness of thought, and 
produced quite a radiance of terror. The side of my mind 
towards the blessed God had, indeed, often beamed with 
devotion and love ; but the side of it towards man had been 
defective in tenderness and humility of feeling and speech. 
I had scorned the abilities of inferior men, and had been 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 31 

in the habit of marking with keen and cool severity the 
mortal defects of good people. I did not know until 
now that I had been guilty of such sins. I was in as 
much penitent distress, though not in such a wilderness of 
troubled thought, as at the time of my conversion. I 
felt that these sins had placed me in a proud and hateful 
opposition to the mind of my Saviour. Most fervently 
did I pray for pardon and renovation, and never were my 
prayers more distinctly answered. These unsanctified 
tempers began to melt away before that Divine light and 
power which revealed their existence ; since that time 
it has been easy and delightful to honour and love my 
fellow-creatures. I was converted to the spirit of the 
second commandment." 

If any have read this last extract hastily, it 
would be a wise thing to read it again ; for, most 
certainly, the more we are inclined to think such 
sentiments insipid and common-place, the more do 
our spirits need to be brought under their influence. 
We have slighted Christ's law of brotherly love ; we 
are in danger of becoming so acclimatized to the 
atmosphere of censoriousness, as not to know that 
we are censorious ; in danger of losing that delicate 
holiness of feeling which will lead us to detect the 
presence and deplore the evil of this crying social 
sin. It may do us lasting good, if we pause to take 
in the full meaning of these sentiments ; sentiments 
whose constant force made him who uttered them, 
what every disciple should be — a searching perfec- 
tionist only with reference to himself ; with refer- 
ence to others, all patience, gentleness, and hope. 

His labours amidst scenes like those which have 
been described were occasionally relieved by visits 



32 POWER IN WEAKNESS. 

to Salisbury and Devizes, where lie had circles of 
friends by whom he was greatly prized. They yet 
call to mind the skill — fresh, gracious, and affec- 
tionate — by which he sought to heal the wounds of 
the heart, and to remove the doubts of the specu- 
lative thinker ; how clearly he would argue ; with 
what warm, compassionate sympathy he would 
plead ; how, when one of the company would try to 
parry the thrust of an argument by what looked 
like a mere ingenious artifice of debate, he would 
rise, take him by the hand, and implore him to be 
in earnest. They remember his passion for truth, 
his delightful turns of expression, and the over- 
flowing ardour of his Christian love. They seem to 
see him now, the spiritual fire sparkling in his eyes, 
lighting up his thin, pale, pain- worn features, and 
sometimes glowing in the rich scintillations of genius 
which shot along the chain of his logical reasonings. 
They remember especially his prayers — their faith, 
their deep spirit of reverence, their indescribable ear- 
nestness, making those who knelt with him to feel 
that the presence of " the King invisible" was a 
vivid reality ; so that even a little child would say, 
" He is speaking to somebody in the room." 



CHAPTER IY. 

' ' Cast as a broken vessel by, 

Thy work I can no longer do ; 
But while a daily death I die, 

Thy power I may in weakness show ; 
My patience may thy glory raise, 
My speechless woe proclaim thy praise. " 

Charles Wesley. 



HELPLESS AFFLICTION. 

In 1823, Mr. Rhodes was seized with a fever, 
and for six months wavered between life and 
death. He never entirely recovered from the 
effects of this calamity. From this time, there 
was not merely a weakness, but an organic and 
incurable defect of speech : he was to be nerve- 
less and weary to the end of his days. Judging 
from appearances, even long after he had left the 
sick chamber, it might have been said, " His 
ministry is now over ; we shall no more even hear 
him converse again." 

" That tongue is silent now. That silent tongue 
Could argue once, could join the jest or song, 

D 



34 POWER IN WEAKNESS ! 

Could give advice, could censure or commend, 
Or charm the sorrows of a drooping friend. 
Renounced alike its office and its sport, 
Its brisker and its graver strains fall short ; 
Both fall beneath a fever's secret sway, 
And like a summer brook have pass'd away." 

During ibis time, besides the sickness itself, be 
suffered from a tbousand small cares, some hints of 
which he gave in one of the first despatches written 
after he was able to resume the use of his pen. 

"Among many other mortal ills, it is my fate to be 
robbed by my nurses. Some time ago, one of them opened 
my desk and appropriated a sovereign. Pardon and ten- 
derness to her memory ! — she is gone from this scene of evil. 
Another, in the midst of my illness, robbed me of a pair 
of large thick blankets. She is a woman of great eloquence 
and bland aspect, sound and scriptural in discourse, and of 
high pretensions to piety. I never believed in her, yet I 
have known and liked her all my life, and have many times 
tried to show her generous kindness. Though too ill to 
talk about it at the time, I had an undoubting opinion of 
her criminality ; for the evidence was too plain to be 
resisted. Having thought about it recently, it seemed 
to be my duty to tell her what I knew. But how to do it 
— how to pierce her with the pain of such a disclosure — I 
knew not. I never felt such a tenderness for weak, sinful, 
tempted humanity. I trembled and prayed almost two 
hours before I could open my lips on the subject. At last 
I sat down by her, and declared my perfect conviction of 
her guilt. I told her that if she would bring back the 
things, I would one day fully repay her the worth of them, 
and forgive her with all my heart. All in vain ! You can 
understand what this has cost me. 

"My throat and mouth are still in great suffering. 
Liquorice has in former times been very healing, but for 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 3-5 

ten days I have tried to get some of it from Fording- bridge, 
without success. Now, if you will send me an ounce of this 
precious substance, I will love and bless you. It is a great 
infelicity to be afflicted in a lonely village, where nothing 
can be obtained for human wants but what is fit for the 
healthy." 

Such things as these, vexing as their friction 
must have been to such a nature, were not to be 
compared in their distressing effect to what he at 
first felt from other causes. 

His inability to read and think as in former 
times, of course, greatly affected him. " In my 
worst troubles," said he, " I could sometimes escape 
from the wilderness, and live in an intellectual 
heaven of my own, but these days and nights are 
past." The one great sorrow that was upon his 
heart was the final disappointment of his hopes as a 
preacher, and the slight amount of success which 
had attended his ministry while he was still able to 
exercise it. Of this he thus wrote to a dear 
friend : — 

"It was my ambition to do good, — the best good to 
souls ; I placed the worth and felicity of my lif e in this : 
but how my holiest wishes have beeu blighted and mortified 
to death ! This has been, is, and will be my deepest grief. 
I have never yet been able to surrender even to God my 
constant mighty wish. Vain and afflicting as it is, without 
strength to render it useful, it will not die. Oh that it had 
pleased my Saviour to have gratified this wish, this one 
wish ! All other wishes for anything happy on earth I long 
ago willingly surrendered." 

Some of the ancients thought that the diamond 



6b POWEK IN "WEAKNESS : 

absorbed the daylight, until it became so steeped in 
brilliance that when the sun went down it could 
scatter light in the darkness. What was a fable in 
science is a truth in religion ; it was true in the life 
of Mr. Rhodes. His dark and mournful thoughts 
soon passed away, and his spirit shone brightly when 
its sun was gone ; for God had filled it with light. 

The change wrought in his feelings during the 
course of this discipline was indeed marvellous. 
" Blessed be the Redeemer," he learned to say, 
" loved and adored be His name for what He has done 
for me." To a friend who had written to comfort 
him, he replied : " Your letters would have com- 
forted me, had I needed comfort ; but now, I really 
have a fulness of consolation to which nothing could 
be added by mortal, however tender and pious." 
Affliction had left its seal upon the body, but " the 
sorrow of the soul, which is the soul of sorrow," 
was gone for ever. 

" A tender Providence shrouded him under her 
wings, and the prophet was fed in the wilderness ; 
and his great worthiness procured him friends, that 
supplied him with bread and necessaries." So wrote 
Bishop Rust of Jeremy Taylor ; and so we may 
write of Christ's humble minister, William Rhodes. 
But from this extremity of weakness he was gra- 
dually restored to comparative strength ; and then, 
partly by working at his original trade, and partly 
by means of a small income which he received from 
a friend, in acknowledgment of inestimable spiritual 
services, he contrived not only to live free from the 



MEMORIALS OF THE KEY. W. RHODES. 37 

worst effects of poverty himself, but to be a generous 
benefactor to others. In the course of the next few 
years he built a cottage for his sisters ; he also re- 
ceived into his house some afflicted relatives, and 
was their watchful attendant and sole supporter till 
they died* Speaking of this attendance at certain 
periods, he said to a friend, "It is my work night 
and day, and the labours of a ploughman are mere 
play to it. I have a hundred times fainted almost 
to death at the sight of the distressing sufferings of 
my charge ; but I bless God my patience never 
failed." The spirit of bis daily life is thus described 
in a letter written during 1824: : — 

' ' There are few things for which I have more reason to 
thank rny Saviour than for the power He has given me of 
combining high thoughts with humble doings. This power 
to unite noble and devotional contemplations with constant 
attention to the numerous cares, and toils, and trifles, and 
nursings of my little family, is a great delight to me. It 
unites into harmony the extremes of existence — the intel- 
lectual and the sensible, the lofty and the mean ; the cares 
of the present with the prospects of the eternal. This is a 
sort of living at the same time all over the universe of our 
being. The things themselves are very remote ; strong 
exercises of the intellect and the habitual contemplation of 
heaven, and a minute regard to bread and tea, firing and 
candles. Yet no reason can be given why a person should 
not try to be a tender and diligent nurse, a prudent and 
frugal housekeeper, and all the time an intellectual and 
elevated Christian." 

Thus was he educated for what seemed to be his 
own peculiar province of service in the Christian 
church — the service of comforting the afflicted. 



38 POWER IN WEAKNESS I 

' ' If aught can teach us aught, Affliction's lookes 
Make us looke into ourselves so near, 
Teach us to know ourselves beyond all bookes, 
Or all the learned schooles that ever were."* 

By these early afflictions did the Lord God give to 
him the tongue of the learned, that he might know 
how to speak a word in season to him that was 
weary. While yet a young man, his conversation 
had the tinge, his very countenance the air, of one 
who had often looked death in the face, who walked 
on the borders of the spirit-land, and who was more 
alive to heaven than to earth. Already had he felt 
the blight of poverty and the stroke of disappoint- 
ment ; he had wrestled with doubts ; he had been 
stung to the quick of the spirit by mortifications* 
He "knew the heart of a stranger." He had gra- 
duated in the school of adversity. Endowed with the 
rare and delicate scholarship which can be acquired 
under no other teaching, he now came forth into the 
" light of the living" ministering as a comforter. 

He was happy everywhere, but most at home with 
the bereaved, with the tempted, and with the des- 
ponding. The mother " weeping for her children, 
and refusing to be comforted \ " the old man grieving 
for his lost Joseph ; the disciple mourning for his 
absent Lord ; the doubter, at one time like Thomas, 
ready to die for Jesus, at another time ready to say, 
" Except I see the print of the nails, I will not be- 
lieve ; " — such sufferers as these were his chosen com- 

* Sir John Davies. 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 39 

pardons ; they understood him, he understood them ; 
listening to their sorrows with reverence, with 
patience, and with exquisite love, he touched chords 
in their nature which no other hand could find, and 
frequently insinuated thoughts of peace which no 
other mortal had been able to convey. 

Some idea of what he was in this respect may be 
gathered from his letters. Here is one, addressed 
to a gentleman who was then in great affliction : — 

* ' Reverential submission to the will of God will do much 
to repress the rebellion of our spirits, and impart a patient 
serenity to our hearts ; but it will not repress frequent and 
unholy wishes that our lot had been different from what it 
is, — it will not make us pleased with the sadness of our 
condition, — it will not inspire joy. Some yet higher senti- 
ments are requisite to produce this frame of mind, which is 
the perfection of an afflicted state. The grand thing we 
want to perfect our repose is this — to understand our dis- 
pensation, our individual chVpensation ; to ascertain the 
reasons and intentions of God for having placed us under it, 
and to see how it is most wisely and tenderly suited to 
promote our highest good. When this most blessed illu- 
mination is obtained by prayer, then in ' His light we see 
light ; ' we are able to look upon our whole condition with 
divine and celestial eyes. We almost see it as God sees it ; 
He is pleased with it, and we are pleased with it. The Go d 
of love has taught me to see the meaning of my own 
dispensation in the clearest light, and I now perfectly ap- 
prove of it with all my heart. I am the most withered and 
insignificant thing in this part of the universe ; but, weak, 
poor, and afflicted as I am, I can truly say that my lot ha s 
become to me one of almost im mingled felicity. The 
sublime paradox, 'Having nothing, and yet possessing all 
things,' is a mystery to me no longer — it is just what I feel. 



40 POWER IN WEAKNESS ! 

I have met with no person so happy as myself ; and it is to 
be ascribed chiefly to my sufferings, or rather to the grace 
of our Redeemer, who has made them His instruments to 
refine and free my spirit, and bring it into more full com- 
munion with himself. 

" I think I understand your affliction almost as well as I 
do my own. Sometimes I have employed hours in tracing 
it out in all its parts and stages, till I have seen all combined 
into one harmonious plan of mercy and good. I have the 
most affectionate and devotional sympathy with you ; yet 
I can see reason and room for abundant consolation that 
you may constantly feel. Suppose these afflictions had 
never come upon you ; that all the wishes of your earlier 
life had been gratified to the full, making a mortal 
Paradise of health, and fame, and social felicities, what 
would have been the result to you now and for ever ? We 
have only to cast abroad a glance on nearly all the souls 
that are doomed to these brilliant calamities, in order to 
answer the question. Had your varied and deep afflictions 
been withheld from you by the hand of God, so far as I am 
acquainted with your history, and with the former hues and 
ardours of your nature, it seems to me that you would have 
felt the full enchantment of the world, eternity would have 
been veiled up by the beautiful and deceptive scenery of 
time, the blessed Redeemer would have been but little 

loved, devotion would have been faint and low 

But, my dearest sir, it is only right and affectionate for me 
to say, in order that you may have more divine quiet of 
soul, that I have clearly seen the good your sorrows have 
done for your character, mingled with and sanctified by the 

grace of God as they have been 'I am the 

true Vine, and my Father is the Vine- dresser. Every 
barren branch in me He cutteth off ; every fruitful branch 
He cleaneth by pruning, to render it more fruitful. ' 

"Ascribe whatever we may to the force of celestial in- 
fluence upon our minds, it is plain that sorrow is the 
sovereign instrument, even in the Divine hand, for moulding 



MEMORIALS OF THE KEY. W. ERODES. 41 

us to the tenderness and refinement of the Christian temper : 
there are many sins which cannot be subdued, many sacred 
elements of the spiritual life which cannot be matured, 
until we are softened, melted, and shattered by pain. Lord 
Bacon's sentiment is a tried and true one, ' Adversity is the 
grand privilege of the New Dispensation.' Some, indeed, 
can be saved without much of it ; but all melancholy minds, 
all minds ardent for the world, all imperious minds, all 
minds of great ambition, must in the nature of things 
undergo a keen severity of discipline, or lose their heaven ; 
men of whom the world is not worthy must be destitute, 
afflicted, tormented. 

' ' The passive virtues are not much wanted in a life of 
health and ease ; yet these are the most sacred virtues that 
have ever been displayed on earth or admired in heaven. 
The c passive ' virtues are in reality the most active ones. 
A great delusion prevails here. We are apt to place 
Christian activities in mere bodily activities. It is a much 
harder thing to suffer well than to work well. It gives an 
ineffable lustre and endearment to the passive virtues, that 
it was by them — it was by the Saviour's patience and resig- 
nation in suffering death — that the most splendid achieve- 
ment ever performed in the universe was accomplished — • 
the world was redeemed ! " 

A friend, who had been suddenly visited with some 
domestic calamity, wrote to inform him of it, and 
here is his reply : — 

"My beloved Friend, — If I could bear the motion of 
the cart, I would certainly ride over and see you to-morrow, 
to say in a thousand forms of consolation what my feeble 
hand will not permit me to write. Will it give you any 
comfort for me to say, though I was grieved, I was not at 
all surprised to hear of the desolation of your heart, and 
your incapacity for confiding and soothing prayer? I 
cannot regard it in any other light than as the natural 



42 POWER m WEAKNESS I 

effect of deep exhaustion of spirit, if not also of body, 
withered and repressed by earthly solicitudes. You have 
indeed been long versed in them, but this sudden concentra- 
tion of their forces upon you has dismayed and borne down 
your heart. The severest admonitory word that your case 
requires, is that you were not sufficiently prepared to re- 
ceive such a stroke with patient and tender submission. 
I am fully convinced that only experience, repeated and 
continued, of severe and mortifying strokes of the Divine 
hand can produce the right temper for receiving them. 
Such is our nature, even when pardoned and renewed, that 
the first inflictions of adversity very often do little more 
than call forth the evil sentiments of our hearts. Time for 
these severities of affliction to operate is generally essential 
to our holy improvement of them. Simply as new and 
repugnant to our nature, they cannot be fully and gratefully 
yielded to at first. You have not yet had time to feel 
aright. 

* ' Look a little deeper into your soul and the constitution 
of vital piety. Taking your case at its worst, but looking 
at it fairly, you will, I trust, find that you are mistaken in 
thinking that it is doing your heart no good — that it is an 
unsanctified and unprofitable affliction. If the trial, by 
eliciting a feeling of repugnance to the Divine conduct, 
gives you a more vivid perception of the evil yet remaining 
in your nature, there is profit. If this painful consciousness 
of evil, not fully detected and unveiled before, induces you 
to will and pray it away, — if it prompts you to aspirations, 
however faint, after a holier state of heart, — there is profit. 
If it should prepare you in your future days to enter into 
fuller sympathy with hearts afflicted in the same manner, 
there is tender and blessed profit. My dear friend, one of 
the holiest benefits of afflictive discipline is, that it reveals 
to us deep secrets of our moral constitution and character. 

1 ' Let me tell you one fact in the history of my own heart. 
It cost me unspeakable toil, prayer, and mortification, 
before I could feel a grateful accordance of heart with the 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 43 

severity of my lot. I can well and sadly remember feeling 
even indignant towards the blessed and only Potentate for 
the rigours He imposed upon me, and this, too, several years 
after the time when I cannot doubt that I became a Chris- 
tian. This remembrance of my own experience, painful 
and humbling as it is, may throw a consoling illumination 
over your dark and mournful state. 

' ' Do not cherish fears respecting your spiritual condition, 
but rather repel them. Your heavenly Father has afflicted 
you with secular distresses, but you must take heed not to 
afflict yourself. Leave in His hands the work of affliction. 
Your feelings are a reason for humility and penitence, but 
not for serious fear. The estimation of a mortal is of little 
avail to a fearing and desponding heart, yet it is something, 
and may kindle an inspiration of hope. I doubt uot that 
you are loved in heaven, and pitied there ; that you 
are precious to the heart of our Lord and Saviour, and that 
He will bless and sustain you. 

"I wish I could give you some hints of holy and soothiug 
counsel for the guidance of your heart under this pressure 

of dreary distress Strive to believe in the 

sympathy of your Redeemer. ' He is touched with a feeling 
of our infirmities. ' What a blessed truth to repose on ! it 
overflows with refreshing delight. It has often been the 
only life of my heart. Be very frequent in very brief 
prayer. I think this is the wisest rule when our hearts are 
overwhelmed within us. Above all other blessings, implore 
a larger measure of the spirit of adoption. Frequently 
address your supplications to our compassionate Redeemer 
himself. Under all deep distresses I have found this the 
most soothing act of devotion. ' Thou art my hiding-place : 
thou shalt save me from trouble ; thou shalt compass me 
about with songs of deliverance.' He will thus save and 
bless you. My hand fails, and refuses to write any more." 

The next was written to the Rev. Christopher 
Anderson, author of " Annals of the English Bible." 



44 POWEK IN WEAKNESS I 

Its object was to comfort liim on the death of his 
wife. This lady was eldest daughter of the Hon- 
ourable James Athill, Chief Justice of the Island of 
Antigua. She, with her sisters, lived at Edinburgh 
at the time Mr. Rhodes was pursuing his studies in 
that city, and he was a frequent and welcome guest 
at their house. 

"1824. 

"My dear afflicted Sir, — Having received the sad 
intelligence of dear Mrs. Anderson's death, I cannot forbear 
expressing the affectionate sympathy I feel for yon under 
this most distressing bereavement. As soon as I heard of 
it, I fell upon my knees to implore from our blessed Father 
the supports and blessings you need in this time of sorrow. 
I implored Him to restrain the excesses of your grief, which 
the most devotionally composed minds are apt to indulge in 
under visitations so piercing as this ; to infuse into your 
heart the sweet peace of resignation — to pity and love your 
motherless children 

"I can offer no considerations to diminish the magnitude 
of your loss, for in my view it cannot be exceeded by any 
mortal privation whatever. The elevation, refinement, 
and vivacity of her mind, — the richness and cordiality of 
her affections, — the dignity, sweetness, and enchantment of 
her manners, — the tincture and tone of devotion which 
pervaded her heart, — the charms and intelligence of her 
conversation, the simplicity and ardour of her piety, — the 
beauty of her whole character, — combine to enhance the 
bitterness of her loss, and to render her memory most 
precious and dear. All the virtues and graces which endear 
a friend, much more a wife, were united in her in> a higher 
perfection than I have seen them exhibited in any other 
person. Her great excellence, her great friendship for me, 
made a very bright and affectionate impression upon my 
mind, which will never fade away. The remembrance of 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 45 

her has given a charm to Edinburgh ever since I left it — 
a charm which has now vanished from the scene, and can 
never be rejDlaced. 

"Though I have been trained to weep with those who 
weep, I am quite unable to estimate the depth of your 
anguish. May the compassionate Redeemer, who is infinite 
in divine sensibility and pity, — who knows your grief, and 
to a great extent will permit its indulgence, — who is him- 
self touched with it, — may He shed upon your pierced and 
broken heart that soft and healing restorative which no 
hand but His own can apply; may He give you a holy 
composure, and help you even now to remember that 
though weeping may endure for a night, joy cometh in the 
morning ! 

8 ' I delight to believe that you do feel comforted to some 
extent even now. . . . And yet, I well know how 
intense grief seals the fountains of consolation, and veils 
the only light which can impart relief. Could I imagine 
for a moment that your mind was precluded from access to 
the sources of comfort, I would venture to admonish you 
with the utmost tenderness. Endeavour to soothe your 
sorrow by remembering that the wisdom and love of the 
blessed Redeemer inflicted it ; that the mysterious event is 
rich in mercy, which you will one day understand ; — that 
it has aspects of mercy perceptible now ; that it has re- 
moved your beloved companion from the imperfections and 
miseries of earth, as well as from its endearments and 
delights, to a higher society and celestial employments. . . 
You will soon be reunited in the presence of God and the 
Lamb. It is not permitted you to sorrow even as others 
who have no hope. There are many considerations which, 
if present to your mind, and applied to your heart, will 
inspire that serenity which is so becoming in a servant of 
Christ. There is no instance of the power of religion 
more delightful than the solemn and tender composure of 
feeling which it produces after a storm of grief. 

"Had I been acquainted with dear Mrs. Anderson's 



46 POWER IN WEAKNESS *. 

prolonged affliction, I should most gladly have written to 
her with the desire to comfort her mind, and to give her a 
final assurance of my cordial regard. I trust she felt all 
the peace in her last moments which might have been 
anticipated from her animated confidence in the blessed 

Redeemer Absent from the body she is 

present with the Lord, enjoying the perfect fruition of His 
love, in which she so much reposed while here below. 
Having passed through the scene of death, having left the 
frailties of mortality behind, she has joined the spirits of 
the just, and appeared 'without fault before the throne of 
God.' May His presence be with you in all its consoling 
sweetness and light ; and may He make this mysterious 
calamity the source of much good to you and your dear 
children ! Amidst such darkness as this, ' light is sown for 
the righteous, and gladness for the upright in heart ; ' light 
that will cheer you on earth, and which will shine in its 
utmost effulgence in the world to come. To that world we 
are rapidly tending, and thither we shall quickly arrive. 
We shall soon depart from this melancholy region of tears, 
to the peace and felicity of Paradise, where no visitations 
of calamity can come to disturb our rest. 

' ' I am deeply affected by the reflection that your dear 
Mrs. Anderson is the third of four sisters who have become 
the victims of death since my first visit to Edinburgh. 
Three of them, all lovely, all devout, are sleeping in the 
dust ; but they sleep in Jesus, ' the resurrection and the 
life ! ' May the God of peace be with you ! " 

TO MRS. SAFFERY. 

' ' I know, my dear friend, that you suffer more than can 
be told in the rude language of mortals, and, believe me, I 
constantly pray that you may be comforted. There are 
many things which would have a divine efficacy of consola- 
tion, if we did but keep them before us. Remember that 
the gracious Redeemer has exhausted and removed every 
penal element of suffering ; and that now, when you suffer, 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 47 

it is only just so much as is absolutely requisite to refine 
and prepare your spirit for the fulness of joy ; when you 
suffer, you are watched and loved every moment by the 
blessed Son of God, partaker and Saviour of our afflicted 
nature. Let us both try to rest our wearied spirits in His 
love. He has hushed our griefs into peace before : He will 
do so again. I will give you a sentence from good old 
Hooker, who was in this path of trouble three hundred 
years before us. He has left this inscription on the wayside 
for pilgrims to read who come after him: — 'Blessed for 
ever and ever be him, whose faith has made him a child of 
God. The earth may shake, the pillars of the world may 
tremble under us, the countenance of the heavens may be 
appalled, the sun may lose his light, the moon her beauty, 
the stars their glory ; but concerning him that trusteth in 
God, . . what is there in the world that shall move his 
heart, alter his affection to God, or the affection of God to 
him? He is not ignorant whose precious blood has been 
shed for him ; he has a Shepherd full of kindness, full of 
care, full of power. ' " 

TO A LADY WHO HAD LOST HER MOTHER. 

"I wish I could comfort and bless you. Gray might 
well say, a person can have but one mother. I know what 
you feeL The old familiar room looks just the same, save 
from one missing presence which will be seen no more. That 
dear voice which lately sounded there — the voice that has 
called you child — you will never hear again. Yet you have 
what you never had before, — you have a mother in heaven. 
You are thought about — thought about at this moment 
in the world of glory ; your most f amiliar friend is waiting 
for you there. Let it be a fresh attraction to a heavenly 
life. Be sure that you have the white robe ready — the 
robe made white in the blood of the Lamb, in which alone 
you can make your appearance, and resume your inter- 
course of delighted affection 1 " 



CHAPTER V. 



1 ' Thou cam'st not to this place by accident ; 
It is the very place God meant for thee : 
And shouldst thou there small scope for action see, 
Do not for this give room to discontent ; 
Nor let the time thou owest to God be spent 
In idly dreaming how thou mightest be, 
In what concerns thy spiritual life, more free 
From outward hindrance or impediment : 
For presently this hindrance thou shalt find 
That without which all goodness were a task 
So slight, that Virtue never could grow strong : 
And wouldst thou do one duty to His mind, 
The Imposer's — over-biirden'd thou shalt ask, 
And own thy need of grace to help ere long." 

E. 0. Tkench. 



THE VILLAGE PASTORATE. 

Prevented simply by physical infirmity from 
being the li^ht of a refined circle and the teacher 
of electrified multitudes, he cheerfully accepted the 
lot assigned to him ; and, since lie could plead for 
Christ in no wider sphere, it was now his ambition 



MEMORIALS "OP THE RET. W. RHODES. 49 

to collect a few farm-servants in the village, and 
live as their pastor. But even in this he seemed 
to be doomed to disappointment. " Is not this the 
carpenter's son 1 Is not his mother called Mary 1 
And his brethren .... and his sisters, are 
they not all with us 1 " Treading in the steps of 
Jesus, his course was impeded by the very same 
class of obstacles ; and at first " the prophet had no 
honour in his own country." 

Two hundred and fifty years ago, Sir "Walter 
Raleigh sometimes resided in the neighbourhood of 
Damerham. One day, after his morning walk amidst 
fern, and white-thorn, and starting deer — along the 
ancient chase, and by the brimming river — he is 
said to have written the following verses to describe 
the scene of his rambles : — 

" Abused mortals ! did you know 
Where joy, heart's- ease, and comforts grow, 

You'd scorn proud towers, 

And seek them in these bowers ; 
Where winds sometimes our words perhaps may shake, 
But blustering care could never tempest inake, 

Nor murmurs e'er come nigh us, 

Saving of fountains that glide by us. 

" Blest silent groves ! may ye be 
For ever mirth's best nursery ! 
May pure contents 
For ever pitch their tents 
Upon these downs, these meads, these rocks, these 

mountains, 
And peace still slumber by these purling fountains, 
Which we may every year 
Find when we come a- fishing; here." 



50 POWER IN WEAKNESS I 

Perhaps a sentimental tourist, visiting the same 
spot only forty years ago, would have been charmed 
with the air of exquisite peace, and the indescribable 
sense of remote seclusion, which still belonged to it ; 
he would have thought that he had at length found 
human nature in its fresh and elementary simplicity ; 
and that here, where " life had stood still for centu- 
ries," where the green leaves and flower-clad cottages 
looked just as they did in the times of the Tudors 
and Stuarts, and where the fashions of the great 
world were unknown, the vexed and tired spirit of 
a good man would find everything to heal its fever, 
and nothing to baffle its love. " It must be an easy 
and delightful thing," he might have thought, "to 
be a pastor here." 

The pastor, however, had a different report to 
make. Whatever might be said of the place itself, 
some of the natives answered to good Robert Her- 
rick's somewhat testy description of his own par- 
ishioners : — 

' ' A people, currish, churlish as the seas, 
And rude almost as rudest savages. " 

Indeed, the people of Damerham in those days were, 
intellectually and morally, even less prepared than 
many other villagers to appreciate and honour the 
signs of a "true minister." It was long before he 
made much way in his endeavours to lift them from 
a life of mere sensation or coarse depravity ; but, as 
he laboured on, "being determined to know nothing 
among them save Jesus Christ and Him crucified " 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 51 

a few drunkards were reclaimed, a few weary 
sufferers comforted, a little band of communicants 
gathered round him, and so decidedly did the Spirit 
of God bless His Word, that, about the year 1829, 
it became needful to seek larger accommodation for 
worship by the erection of a chapel. Now, this 
"house built for the Lord" was truly a sublime 
work. Not that it was " exceeding magnifical ; " 
there were no " chapiters, " over which gold and 
silver light floated, no pillars crowned with "lily- 
work," no miracles of rich sculpture and airy tra- 
cery ; and yet it would in some respects bear a 
comparison with the great work which King David 
projected at Jerusalem. It was built in the same 
spirit, had as true a consecration, and there were 
times when it was filled with as bright a glory. 
The poor people brought their contributions to it 
on the very principle which actuated the builders 
of the Temple. Some brought stones, others wood, 
and after the labours of the field were over, some 
would help to raise the walls, others to thatch the 
roof ; the- pastor himself, trembling with weakness, 
making the benches, the little desk in the corner, 
and the door with its clinking cottage latch. The 
pecuniary cost of the edifice, and a dwelling con- 
nected with it, amounted to fifty pounds, which he 
subscribed alone — the result of great self-denial and 
no little genius for finance. Here he ministered to 
the end of his days, not only without the slightest 
worldly remuneration, but meeting from his own 
resources every incidental expense ; " the abundance 



52 POWER IN WEAKNESS ! 

of his joy and deep poverty abounding unto the 
riches of his liberality • " and though there was but 
little external encouragement to his work, it may be 
said with reference to many a glorified spirit, " The 
Lord shall count, when He writeth up His people, 
this man was born there." 

While thus humbly serving Christ in his owm 
retired field, he watched with a vivid and affection- 
ate interest those who were doing similar service in 
other circles, and with other denominational con- 
victions. He would, for instance, frequently express 
his delight in the revival of the evangelical spirit in 
the Church of England ; and at times his expres- 
sions of sympathy and hope with regard to the 
prospects of that church were intensely sanguine. 
Here is a specimen : — 

* ' Conscientious Dissenter as I am, holding, as a part of 
my religion, that the Church and the world are essentially 
distinct in their nature — that consequently the Church 
should not be supported by State resources, and of course 
be subjected to State control ; doubting, as I do, the value 
of that devotional emotion which is inspired by forms and 
postures, and by the consideration of standing amidst 
consecrated objects and on holy ground; thinking, as I 
must, that our simple means of worship are very superior, 
leaving us nothing to revere but the majesty of truth and 
the presence of God ; I rejoice to hope and believe that a 
far brighter destiny awaits the Church of England as an 
instrument of immortal good than she has ever yet attained. 
JSTo devout lover of it can be more delighted than I am by 
the splendid anticipation of the time when we may hope 
that she will become all that a generous piety can wish ; 
when, free from State trammels, she will no longer be 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 53 

under the dominion of secular minds who regard her riches 
and political uses as her chief dignity, and who, not under- 
standing the spirituality of religion, endeavour to reduce it 
to a system of venerable forms, in reality leaving the 
interests of the Church and the interests of religion to be 
pursued as separate concerns ; when it will no longer be 
the occasion of division and disunion amongst the followers 
of one common Lord; when the moss of religious decay 
which has so long grown over it shall be displaced by the 
loveliness and bloom of life ; in a word, when all its large 
and magnificent powers of doing good shall be put forth 
with wide and vivid operation, to assist men in breathing 
the spirit of Christ and wearing the graces of heaven. 
Then, even if it should continue to retain its many imper- 
fections of constitution, they will be absorbed and lost in 
the general spirituality and brightness of piety ; those forms 
of devotion, the most tender and touching that holy wisdom 
has ever devised, will become warm with the flush of life, 
and will breathe forth the incense of refreshing adoration. 
That such a restoration to life awaits the Church, I cannot 
but hope and almost believe. Though she is at present to a 
great extent mourning and desolate, under the dominion of 
the world, yet she is exhibiting signs of life after a long 
period of almost suspended animation, receiving perpetual 
accessions of devoted ministers, who are anxious to make 
her institutions great seminaries of wisdom and love for 
training immortal spirits for the kingdom of heaven. Though 
unable to resist the strong and decisive evidence against 
the scripturalness of her secular connexions, as well as of 
many things in her apparatus of government, worship, and 
instruction, I should, if possible, be the first to say to her, 
from my obscure corner, 'Arise, shiue, for thy light is 
come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee.' " 

This to some may look like laxity, but it was only 
love. jSTo spirit shows more invincible decision than 
that which is sometimes mistaken for neutrality. 



o4 power m weakness : 

A man of no party is a man of no principle ; but a 
man who is not the champion of an extreme section, 
and who, although he has calmly taken his stand 
for life on one side, is thoughtfully alive to what 
may be said in favour of the other, is the man most 
to be trusted by the community to which he belongs. 
This was illustrated in the present instance : — " My 
wide latitude of belief and hope with regard to 
others," wrote Mr. Rhodes, " does not prevent my 
feeling the deepest solicitude to discover for myself, 
and to receive with reverential awe and simplicity, 
every minute ramification of every minute truth or 
law which has descended from heaven.' 7 It is said 
that more than once opportunities were afforded 
him of entering within "the pale ecclesiastic," and 
that it seemed to some of his advisers that he would 
have greater facilities for doing good in his own 
peculiar way in such a sphere than in the one he 
had chosen ; but no considerations of taste, ex- 
pediency, or advantage could shake his free-church 
principles, although he deeply regretted the accident 
which in this country renders those principles 
" Dissenting," and thus places their advocates in a 
state of involuntary separation from so many of 
their brethren in Christ. 

The extracts which follow give some of the results 
of his pastoral experience and observation. Like 
some of the others, they are gleaned from letters, 
and from confused pencil jottings on carefully-saved 
fragments of waste paper. 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 55 



INTELLECTUAL RELIGION IS DESIRABLE. 

' ' It is delightful to reflect that the most holy and felici- 
tous influence of our religion may be felt by rude and un- 
cultivated minds. But even truths of unlimited magnitude 
and glory seem to take something of the littleness and 
debasement of the minds in which they reside. I sometimes 
feel a melancholy sentiment, when mingling with some of 
the poor, and with many who are not poor, to observe their 
confinement and poverty of thought, their vague concep- 
tions, and their little powers of conversation, when that 
glorious subject is introduced which replenishes the facul- 
ties and inspires the eloquence of spirits in another sphere. 
What a dim and wavering sight of the High and Holy 
One who inhabiteth eternity ! what an insensibility to the 
dignity of being immortal ! and how even the central facts 
of the gospel are faintly believed in as naked facts only, 
and not as infinitely suggestive, kindling, influential 
wonders ! These persons have not the proper use of their 
f acidties. Verily, they ' are at home in the body. ' ' Then- 
talk is of oxen, and they glory in the goad. ' Their minds 
have never been quickened by continuous action, and, 
absorbed in the common toils of life, will remain dormant, 
till the body dies, and they are roused to sensibility and 
thought by the voices and visions of eternity. Meanwhile, 
thanks to our blessed Saviour, many of them are tasting the 
sweetness and feeling the consoling efficacy of religion, 
although blind to its intellectual splendour. But those who 
have time to command, should feel it their sacred vocation 
to expand and train their minds by vigorous thinking, that 
they may widen and brighten their perceptions of the reli- 
gion they profess to love. This I have done as much as 
circumstances would permit, with the express hope of being- 
able to form more ample and magnificent views of my 
Saviour and His work. 

"In reading for this purpose, we shall have compara- 
tively little assistance from modern religious books. They 



56 POWER IN WEAKNESS ! 

are frequently of a weak and infant order, — confined in their 
range to the contemplative and emotional department of 
piety. Yet they are read, while the truly devotional and 
lofty productions of a former age are neglected — productions 
of men fervent in spirit, rich in thought, and beautiful in 
their play of illustrative fancy, whose very ashes are sun- 
beams compared with the brightest conceptions of the pious 
and popular divines who now guide and instruct us. It 
is partly owing to the general cast of modern religious 
reading, that modern piety is so far from being of a vigorous 
and thoughtful tone." 



INTELLECTUAL KELIGION IS NOT ESSENTIAL. 

"After all I have frequently said of the evils which 
result from piety being mingled with ignorance, in the 
minds of the poorer classes more especially, it is the poor — 
the poor in intellect as well as in circumstances — who have 
most of that undisputing simplicity of heart which the King 
delighteth to honour with His benediction and presence. I 
am perfectly convinced that much more of the illuminating 
Spirit is given to very many of them than to most pious 
minds of richer culture. There is a pride in cultivated 
reason which even the most devout can hardly repress, even 
when meditating on the Word of God. The slightest tinc- 
ture of this satanic spirit is offensive to Him, and causes Him 
to withhold His grace. We may covet the happiness of those 
humble, pious men who read the Bible with entire devotion, 
and yet have not penetration enough to detect its myste- 
rious difficulties. I sometimes look wistfully back on those 
simple days when my spiritual life was commencing ; when 
I used to go forth to my labours with the New Testament 
in my pocket, that I might glance over its pages at the next 
leisure moment. I read it with fresh, unworn, unspeak- 
able interest. It was Adam's first walk in Paradise. Yet 
I then had no thought of its intellectual grandeur or literary 
beauties, little thought even of the ineffable sublimity of 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 57 

the prospects it opens and the truths it tells. I seemed 
only alive to its tenderness and solemnity. Christ was 
there. I went to Him for life, and found it. I was bap- 
tized and absorbed in His dying love. I perceived more and 
more clearly that His love was the one theme of His word, 
its celestial riches, its wonderful peculiarity ; and I reposed 
and delighted in it as my highest joy. 

" Since that time, I have too much indidged the habit, so 
incident to thoughtful persons, of mediating on the Word 
of God for the supreme sake of having my intellect em- 
ployed and delighted. This was especially the case during 
part of my life at Edinburgh. I applied my metaphysics to 
it, seeking to know what may not yet be known, and was 

guilty of unholy daring Gradually I lost many 

of my first simple and affecting sentiments. My mind was 
greatly disturbed. For a time, there was fluttering uncer- 
tainty of thought ; but, like the dove, I soon flew back to the 
Ark. My Saviour was most merciful to me. He saw my 
dangers, and has kept me to this hour. Still, the consider- 
ation of the many imperfections and mistakes which are 
connected with my study of His truth, makes me long, in 
my best moments, to be quickly removed to the state of 
perfect illumination. " 

IT IS DANGEROUS TO REPRESS THE AFFECTIONS. 

' 'Pity those perpendicular, angular, frigidly accurate 
good men, who never betray an emotion, never express an 
affection. Dry as a diagram, cold as a stone, entirely pas- 
sionless in manner, ^ yet never wittingly holding a wrong 
principle, or doing a wrong thing. It was not always thus 
with some of them. They were once full of gentle feeling, 
but they stifled it, being too shy or too proud to give it 
expression. By this reserve they inflicted upon them- 
selves a fatal injury,— they put their own hearts to death. 
If you keep your social affections secret — 'a fountain 
sealed,' 'a garden enclosed,'— if you hide them amidst 



58 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

the shadows of your inner nature, like flowers in the dark, 
they will wither and die. Let the world be the better for 
them ; give them free, light-hearted speech ; bring them 
out into the fresh air and sunshine, that they may grow 
and flourish, pouring forth sweet odours, acceptable, well- 
pleasing to God and to man." 



RELIGION IS NOT A MERE EXPEDIENT FOR OUR OWN 
SAFETY. 

' ' Many Christians seem to wish for safety rather than 
excellence, and to care more for comfort than for duty. 
The one question into which they seem to concentrate the 
vigour and intensity of the soul is this, Ami safe ? In their 
conversations on religion they lay down a thousand marks 
and tests of safety, but say little about incentives to the 
attainment of sublime goodness. The time which is con- 
sumed on this perplexing inquiry would, if well employed, 
raise them to an eminence of piety which hesitations and 
doubts could not visit. This unscriptural solicitude about 
safety, and the wrong direction which is given to it, has a 
wide and most wretched influence. It confines a man's 
attentions and wishes within the little sphere of his own 
little soul, and will not let him go out in generous efforts 
and burning prayers for others. The world of souls among 
which he is placed may perish : — that he may feel safe is all. 
The selfishness of our nature, which the amazing generosity 
of the Son of God is most eminently adapted and intended 
to destroy, is wonderfully invigorated by this delusion. It 
locks up in the dungeon of man's own wretched soul that 
fine spirit of honour and benevolence which all the voices of 
heaven are calling forth into noble and delighted exertion. 
It even gives a character of selfishness to the actions of 
benevolence itself. This vile temper, which is so much 
hated in heaven, so much opposed in the New Testament, 
so fatal to our purest peace, is cherished by the supreme 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 59 

wish for safety which so many sermons inspire and so many 
Christians feel. Safety and comfort — this is what the good 
people talk about at home — what they talk about in Christian 
society, what they are concerned about in the house of God ; 
and the instructions they hear are hated or loved as they 
promote or impair that one beloved thing." 



OUR EDUCATION FOR ETERNITY. 

* ' Guilty and debased as we are, weak and humbled as 
we are, in this mortal state, truly we are awful beings in 
our character and prospects. There is no insignificance, 
no mortality, in character. I almost constantly feel the 
serious and dignified conviction that this mortal is even 
now putting on immortality, — immortality of character, — 
storing up in itself the elements of endless good or evil 
which the ages and worlds to come will only confirm and 
finish. If we forget this, God forgets it not ; and a solemn 
proof of the importance which belongs to the formation of 
right character is shown in the innumerable agencies, seen 
and unseen, earthly and celestial, which He is continually 
employing to educate our spirits for their future spheres. 
Sometimes I am filled with amazement when I think of the 
incidents, society, books, conversations, scenes in nature, 
the seasons, pains, sorrows, felicities, the countless passing 
things which, sanctified by the Divine Spirit, are making 
impressions and nourishing principles which will be joyful 
as heaven and lasting as eternity. Nearly all the elements 
and powers of the universe seem to be concentrated upon a 
single redeemed spirit. What must be the unlimited worth 
of that which the Father of spirits is training by such an 
infinity of means ! I can bear a grateful testimony to this 
great fact. Almost everything which has touched and 
affected me since I have been His forgiven child, has done 
me good. Numberless trifles have done it. I have just 
been looking on a rose, and it made me think of the God of 



60 POWER IN WEAKNESS. 

roses, and bless Him. for adorning the world with so much 
beauty. The old Hebrew poets felt their devotion inspired 
and instructed by similar memorials of their invisible God. 
They gathered a lesson of adoration from almost everything 
they saw, felt, and heard. Their very senses were* sanc- 
tified." 



CHAPTER VI. 



' Be calm in arguing ; for fierceness makes 
Error a crime, and truth discourtesy. 
Why should I feel another man's mistakes 
More than his sicknesses or poverty ? 
In love I shoidd ; but anger is not love, 
Is or wisdom neither ; therefore gently move." 

George Herbert. 



LETTERS ON DISPUTED QUESTIONS IN RELIGION. 

His influence for Christ reached far beyond the 
sphere of his "bodily presence." Many who might 
have thought that he was " weak/' and "his speech 
contemptible," were compelled to admit that "his 
letters were weighty and powerful." He was 
always writing, and always on one theme ;. for, like 
Luther, he might have written the great name 
"Jesus" as the motto of every letter. Many of 
these letters have been lately collected. There is a 
series, full of rich wisdom and love, addressed to a 
young clerical friend, on " The Church of England." 
Many are written to persons suffering under be- 



62 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

reavements ; others are on such subjects as "Irv- 
ingism," " Neglected Points of Christian Ethics," 
" The Uses of the Atonement," " The Work of the 
Holy Spirit," and "The Divinity of Our Saviour." 
Sentences occur in his private papers which afford 
touching illustrations of the spirit which prompted 
this correspondence. Though he wrote no diary, 
not choosing "to make the world his confidant," it 
seems that sometimes while sitting, pen in hand, 
" waiting for an inspiration," he would, almost 
unconsciously, write on a scrap of paper close at his 
side some prayer that was rising in his heart ; so 
that a person looking over the leaves of his almost 
illegible manuscript, will here and there light on 
words like these : — 

' ' Lord, help my poor perplexed friend at T . " ' ' Holy 

and blessed Father of lights, Father of my own poor and 
ignorant spirit, remote and sublime in infinitude beyond all 
thought, yet most condescending and close to me in thy 
presence, help me to think and write of thy blessed Son 
with all simplicity and reverence. Thou hast said, This 
is my beloved Son, in whom I am always delighted : 
help me to be delighted in Him as Thou art. Dispose the 
heart of my friend to all this. . . ." 

These secret prayers have been answered. One 
minister of Christ at least, is, under God, unspeak- 
ably indebted to the letters of Mr. Rhodes for a 
clear and joyful faith in the "great mystery of 
godliness." 

A person in whose religious welfare he had long 
taken great interest, was on the point of embracing 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 63 

the sentiments of Mr. Irving : while in an undecided 
state of mind, he requested the opinion of Mr. 
Rhodes on certain points in the system which was 
beginning to attract him. The following was 
written in reply : — 

THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH; AND THE EXTRAORDINARY 
GIFTS OF THE SPIRIT. 

"By the novelists in religion — by the ignorant, whose 
curiosity is fired and gratified — by the light and superficial, 
whose thoughts are wafted about by every wind of doctrine 
— by the imaginative, who are easily delighted and subdued 
by solemn splendours of imagery — by young, ardent, 
undisciplined pious minds, soon touched and charmed by 
the apparently superior holiness and glory of these views 
over those of the common creed, Mr. Irving' s doctrines 
will be felt to be very impressive and appealing ; and will 
be likely to kindle a frenzy of religious emotions certain 
to check the clear and healthy workings of the mind. I 
hope you will guard yourself against these deceptive 
influences. "Without assuming, at present, whether these 
views are true or false, permit me, my dear friend, to 
express my serious fear that several qualities of your 
nature, good and beautiful as they are, when well regu- 
lated, expose you to great danger. Your sensitive and 
glowing mind, so quick to take poetical impressions, your 
noble mental independence, predisposing you to side with 
what is harshly opposed, all impel you in the same direc- 
tion. And here let me say that I do not blame you in the 
slightest degree for engaging in your present inquiries, only 
I wish you had done it alone, and decided for yourself, 
before you had mingled with the party ; for you are now 
on enchanted ground, and amidst influences almost magi- 
cally deceptive ; you are in danger lest your mind shoidd 
lose that calmness and freedom from bias, which would be 
most favourable to the clear perception of the truth. 



64 POWER in weakness: 

" You will find in the volume I send you much solid 
and enlarged thought respecting the great prospect of the 
Millennium. I will not, therefore, touch upon this subject, 
except just to cite one simple scriptural argument which I 
have never seen in print, and which, to my own mind, is 
very decisive. It is this : — ' The Lord said unto my Lord, 
Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy 
footstool.' In the Acts of the Apostles (ii. 34 — 36) this 
prophecy is quoted, and the Lord is said to be already on 
His throne ; in the Hebrews (x. 12) there is another allusion 
to it, and we read, ' This man, after He had offered one 
sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of 
God ; from henceforth expecting till all His enemies be 
made His footstool. ' In 1 Corinthians (xv. 26) it is said, 
' The last enemy that shall be destroyed is Death.' These 
passages combined appear to me an inspired declaration 
that our Saviour is already on the throne, and there will 
remain in one continued, unbroken process of rule, until all 
His enemies, including Death the last, shall be destroyed, at 
the time of general resurrection and judgment. 

"This, however, is but introductory to the main topics 
on which you request my opinion, — the piety of the primi- 
tive church as compared with that of the present, the 
extraordinary gifts of the Spirit in regard to their duration 
in the church, and my reasons for decidedly rejecting the 
modern pretensions to these celestial endowments. 

"I. There are few subjects regarding ancient times on 
which greater mistakes and delusions j>revail than respecting 
the piety of the primitive Christians. That the first 
Christians were blest with the most finished instruments 
and helps for cultivating a vigorous and elevated piety is 
very plain ; that a good number of them attained such a 
piety is equally plain ; but what ground have we for 
supposing this to have been the case with the majority? 
It is wonderful to me how any thoughtful reader of the 
New Testament can do it — how any student of human 
nature can do it. Our nature is the same in all ages, and 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 65 

offers the same resistance to the spirit of holiness. Even 
in the best condition to which the Gospel can raise us on 
earth, we are weak, sinful, tempted beings. Such are we : 
such were the first Christians. Though hearing the voice 
of inspiration from day to day, and conrpelled by their 
trials to repair to their Saviour's love for their only 
shelter and rest, they did not breathe the air of heaven, 
nor were they invested with its holy charms. They were 
only men and women, pardoned, it is true, but imperfectly 
enlightened and sanctified. What sin can be found in the 
churches now, that was not exemplified amongst them? 
Read the melancholy descriptions of Paul in some of his 
epistles — those of James, and John, and Jude. Read the 
admonitions of the Searcher of hearts to the seven churches 
which had been planted and nourished by His beloved dis- 
ciple. I gather this inference from these affecting pages, 
that, while there were many persons of noble piety and 
love scattered amongst the different churches, the gene- 
rality of these first Christians were much more imperfect 
than sincere Christians are now. I have no doubt what- 
ever of there being in this land, and in other parts of the 
world, many churches which are in a holier and happier 
state than any of the primitive societies, watched as they 
were by the very eyes which had seen the Saviour of the 
world ; taught by the very voices which had often replied 
to His questions ; beamed upon by the very faces which had 
reflected the glance of His face Divine. No maxim in 
religion appears to me to be more certain than this — that 
the first ages of the church were not the holiest and best. 
I believe most fully that, apart from the Apostles them- 
selves, since the Reformation there have been multitudes of 
Christians in the world wiser and better than ever peopled 
the promised or any other region of ancient life. 

"II. Now for a few words with regard to the gifts of 
the blessed Spirit, and their duration in the church. You 
and many others are of opinion that they would have been 
continued until now, if the Spirit in these His works had 

F 



66 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

not been despised and rejected. Let us see if there be any- 
ground for this notion in the sacred word. First : these 
extraordinary gifts were conferred by our ascended Saviour 
on His Apostles, and probably on all that were assembled 
with them on the day of Pentecost. But after that time it 
is to be observed, that, with the single exception of Paul, 
there is no proof that He ever directly bestowed them on 
any other person. This is a fact to be borne in mind on 
all our meditations on the subject. Secondly: the power 
of communicating these wonderful gifts to others was con- 
fined to the Apostles. It was one of their peculiar distinc- 
tions. There is not the slightest proof that any other 
members of the church, however highly endowed with the 
gifts themselves, had the power of communicating them to 
others. A striking proof of this occurs in the 8th chapter 
of Acts: — 'Now when the apostles which were at Jeru- 
salem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, 
they sent unto them Peter and John : who, when they 
were come down, prayed for them, that they might receive 
the Holy Spirit : (for as yet He was fallen upon none of 
them.) Then they laid their hands on them, and they 
received the Holy Spirit.' Since, the Apostles alone were 
empowered to communicate those gifts, it follows that they 
ceased of necessity with the death of those who possessed 
them. Thirdly : there is no promise or intimation that 
those gifts, when withdrawn from the church, shall ever be 
restored. If there be such promise, where is it to be 
found? You may read through the Book of Revelation, 
where the fortunes of the church to the end of time are so 
largely depicted, without finding a single word to encou- 
rage the belief that the church is ever to be blest with the 
restoration of those wonderful gifts that adorned it in the 
days of its infancy. Fourthly : those who are well versed 
in the history of the church during the second and third 
centuries, clearly perceive the fact that the Christians of 
those times, so far from despising these gifts of* the Spirit, 
gloried in the imaginary possession of them long after 






MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 67 

they were gone. It was natural that they should do so. 
The distinction which these endowments conferred was so 
splendid and impressive in the eyes of the world, and so 
delightful to the parties distinguished, that plainly they 
could not relinquish their pretension to them without regret. 
As no proof exists that they were withdrawn because they 
were slighted, no proof exists that they will be restored 
because they are desired. 

' ' But what ground is there for saying that the gifts of 
the Spirit are despised by the church? I trust there are no 
Christians who are guilty of this. They may despise vain 
pretensions to them, while they revere the gifts themselves. 
For my own part, if I could perceive any grounds for 
expecting the impartation of these divine powers, I would 
pray for them day and night. But to expect what my 
Saviour has not promised to bestow, is not faith, — it is 
superstition. 

"III. And now let me show you my reasons for deci- 
dedly rejecting the modern pretensions to these gifts. 

"1. I gather a strong presumption, on scriptural 
grounds, against these present claims. The extraordinary 
gifts of the primitive church were predicted in the Old 
Testament in language peculiarly abundant and impressive. 
But where is there a word of Divine promise that they 
shall be granted to the present or any future age? The 
entire absence of this seems to me to be fatal to all present 
and future hopes of the sort. If, then, gifts are to be 
granted to the church in all their ancient variety and gran- 
deur, they will form a magnificent period in its annals 
inferior only to the first revelation of His word when the 
Lord was here. If these gifts are here already, or will be 
here soon, is it not strange that G-od should change the 
conduct He has observed in predicting all great changes in 
His dispensations, and thus for the first time burst out upon 
the world without giving notice of His approach ? "When 
those gifts appeared,, there was firm ground for expecting 
them, startling and sublime as they were, — for they had 



68 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

been promised ; they therefore excited little surprise among 
the prepared and expectant servants of Christ. With the 
utmost calmness, Peter said to the wondering crowd, ' This 
is what was spoken by the prophet Joel. ' Has any prophet 
predicted that this or any coming age is thus to be adorned 
and glorified ? 

"2. I gather a second presumption against these modern 
claims to miraculous power from their plain inutility in the 
present state of religion among us. The only wise God has 
never wasted and lavished these celestial endowments, — 
never bestowed them except when they were solemnly 
needed. A sacred frugality and reserve in employing this 
order of means has marked His conduct in all ages. When 
so copiously granted to the first Christians, they were 
indispensable. They cheered and aided the infant church 
amidst her sufferings and conflicts ; they awed the disobe- 
dient within her own pale ; — they awed the world into 
reverential attention ; they were a sign to unbelievers, that 
God was with His people. Above all, they established the 
divine truth of the gospel, and the universal supremacy of 
our glorified Lord. Are they needed for these purposes 
now, when the gospel is able to sustain its claim to divinity 
by the lustre and certainty of its own completed evidence, 
and when even the majority of those who withhold their 
affections, accord their intellectual assent ? Take the gift 
of prophecy. The office of prophet in the ancient church 
was not so much to predict future things as to explain 
former revelations. What need have we for this gift, now 
the New Testament has poured such a flood of radiance 
over the mysteries of the Old? Take the gift of foreign 
languages. This was of the highest use and beauty to the 
first messengers of the faith ; but of what use is it to men 
who spend their lives among a people who, witli themselves, 
all speak the same language ? It would be like conferring 
gold on Rothschild. 

* ' 3. There is yet another presumption against the divinity 
of those pretensions. They include, of course, the claim to 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 69 

inspiration, and the power to reveal new messages from 
heaven. In your opinion, although the apostolic office has 
long ceased in the church, it has recently been restored, 
and it is your serious belief that you are now in the pre- 
sence of inspired men invested with the awful dignity of 
prophets and apostles. Now, if I were disposed to believe 
that this was no vain pretence, and that certain modern 
revelations came from God, I should be filled with awful 
perplexity ; for if they are divine, they are of the same 
authority as the written word, and they claim the same 
reverence. Yet how can any thus reverence them, without 
exposure to the awful doom pronounced on such as add to 
the things that are written ? I see no way of escape from 
this great perplexity. It should make every devout spirit 
tremble, lest this malediction of the great Eternal should 
light upon it. 

' ' If our Lord had intended to restore these gifts to the 
church, I believe He would have done it in the time of the 
Reformation, when His servants had as great a conflict to 
endure in restoring the true doctrines of the cross as the 
first Christians suffered in first proclaiming them. They 
might have answered a glorious purpose then, yet they 
were not imparted. If they are ever imparted in future, I 
believe it will be amidst similar circumstances, or for the 
assistance of missionaries in pagan regions, where we can 
conceive of their subservience to a practical end. 

"IV. It appears to me that there are many dangers 
inseparable from the belief of these claims. 

"One danger which is likely to operate with peculiar 
force is the mistaking sensations for principles, — the excite- 
ment produced by novelty for the fervour of true religion. 
I believe that, sooner or later, the whole delusion will 
explode, and that many who have adniired it, in the 
anguish of mortified feelings and hopes, will give up all 
religion. 

"Another danger is the censorious spirit induced by 
them. Their advocates delight in representing religion as 



70 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

in a withered, blighted state. They can see scarcely any 
life or loveliness in onr nnmerons churches ; scarcely any 
value in the works those churches are performing for the 
good of the world. For instance, even you, to my asto- 
nishment and grief, propose the question, 'What is the 
church now, but the shadow of a substance ? ' Kow, the 
wisdom or the folly, the piety or impiety, of the dismal 
opinion thus suggested, depends upon this : — What is the 
real state of spiritual religion in this country ? I can assure 
you, that, after taking great pains for a long time to arrive 
at a right conclusion on this point, my opinion is decidedly 
opposed to yours. Perhaps no man feels more tenderly 
thau I do the disorders that affect the church, stealing her 
strength, and shading her beauty ; but, at the same time, 
I perceive abundant evidence that the Lord has done and 
is doing a great and mighty work amongst us. At no 
period since the Reformation has there been half so many 
souls penetrated with the things of God and eternity ; at 
no period since the Apostles has there been such generous, 
devotional, and laborious efforts made for the. salvation of 
mankind. The Bible Society alone is pouring more sacred 
light upon the world than was diffused in a century during 
the primitive times ; and if God be true to His promise, 
that His Word shall not return unto Him void, this won- 
derful spread of His Word must be producing a wonderful 
effect. I will not enlarge. You see my opinion is this, — 
that, notwithstanding all drawbacks, these times are, upon 
the whole, the most holy and delightful the world has ever 
seen. The case stands thus : — You affirm that Christians 
in general are guilty of despising the work of the Spirit by 
opposing these recent claims to supernatural power, claims 
which are, to use the most candid terms, without divine 
attestations to their truth. I affirm that you and your 
party are guilty of slighting the Spirit, by denying or 
speaking with contempt of a certain work of the Spirit 
which is radiant and conspicuous in the highest degree. 
Poor Irving sinned in this way. He laboured to expose 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 71 

the faults of the Christian church, to reduce the value of its 
works, and to cast a shadow over its brightest and most 
beautiful life. This unhappy temper was forced upon h im 
by his theory of the Millennium. He fancied that it was 
near at hand — that when the Saviour should come to esta- 
blish, he would find little religion on earth— and that 
therefore little religion is to be found now. To vindicate 
this theory, which was supreme in his mind, he denied the 
faith of his fellow-believers, and depicted the church as the 
very sepulchre of godliness ! 

' ' A great evil attendant on these views is, they have 
added another to the real schisms of the church of Christ. 
The true bond of union with Christians is their common 
union with Christ. To separate from those who are thus 
related, is schism. But no sooner are these views adopted 
by any, than they separate from their brethren. This is 
universally the case ; and for no other reason than that 
their brethren do not welcome those visionary appendages 
to essential Christianity which they themselves have ac- 
cepted. This is sinning against the law of love, which is 
the very soul of religion. This wisdom cannot be from 
above. ISTo inspirations that our Lord may ever confer 
upon His servants can contradict the testimony of former 
inspirations, or clash with His ancient laws. 

' ' Do not be seduced by these novelties. Dread lest 
they should ever become the master- sentiments of your 
mind. Take care lest you call away your mind from the 
plain, vital truths which are able to make you wise unto 
salvation. ' The just shall live by faith,' — but in faith in 
what is already revealed, not in new revelations. Even if 
these gifts and inspirations are divine, they are not the 
gospel, — they are not the bread of life that has been given 
before, — they are not personal religion ; they are at best 
but the mere draperies and adornments of it. ' Though I 
speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not 
charity, I am become as sounding brass or a tinkling 
cymbal And though I have the gift of prophecy, and 



i Z POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

understand all mysteries, and all knowledge ; and though 
I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and 
have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.' " 

The extracts which follow were written in 1825, 
in reply to some questions which had been asked 
him by a bereaved friend. 



WILL OUR EARTHLY CHRISTIAN FRIENDSHIPS BE CON- 
TINUED IN HEAVEN? 

" There are many circumstances which throw much 
indistinctness and uncertainty over our views of what the 
social condition of heaven will be. Such as these, which I 
can only just name : — 

' ' From the language of Scripture, it is quite certain that 
heaven is a real place, a material abode, and not a mere 
state, as many are pleased to assert. But whether it be a 
vast and splendid cluster of worlds, or one spacious, magni- 
ficent, and almost unlimited continent of light and beauty, 
we are not informed. Yet our intercourse must consider- 
ably depend upon this. 

"Then, even if the saved of mankind were the only 
people there, is it likely that amidst the numberless 
myriads of our own race alone, each individual will be able 
to find his own ' familiar friend ? ' But these will not be 
the only inhabitants of heaven. There are its nobler and 
more ancient nations. More than this, from its being the 
highest part of the creation of God, and the scene of His 
visible presence, we may justly infer that it is the common 
• home and Paradise of all holy creatures, and that its society 
will be increasingly composed of races and families from 
various worlds of the universe. Does it not look as if each 
of us would find himself among a heaven of strangers ? 

"Were we to be removed to heaven with our present 
nature only refined and made immortal, we could easily 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 73 

anticipate how we should feel and act ; but not so. Our 
nature is to be dissolved to its very rudiments at death. 
Now, all that pertains to us simply as beings of this world, 
all the instincts of the body, many of our sensibilities, 
perhaps many of the properties which now influence the 
mode of our social intercourse, will be dropped, to be re- 
sumed no more. Our ignorance of what we shall be, when 
deprived of all these, gives much uncertainty to our con- 
ceptions of heaven. 

' ' We have scarcely any revelation of the glorified state 
but as a scene of divine glory and devotional felicity. The 
heaven of the New Testament is strictly a devotional 
heaven, — perhaps to impress upon us the conviction that to 
be fitted for it we must be devotional. ISTow, we know that 
when the heart is deeply devotional to the blessed God, 
social wishes and considerations almost disappear. You 
have felt this in public worship. You have had scarcely a 
wish or a thought of those around you. The inferior 
affection was absorbed and displaced by the greater and the 
holier. "Will not the visible presence of God displayed in 
ineffable holiness, beauty, and effulgence all over the regions 
of heaven, meeting us wherever we turn, surrounding us 
every moment — will it not produce in us an indifference to 
the presence and regard of creatures — an oblivion of social 
affections and delights ? So we may be apt to imagine at 
first. 

4 ' The Scriptures speak of peculiar rewards of grace that 
will be conferred in heaven on those who have possessed 
peculiar grace on earth. The present differences in piety 
are immense — so will be the rewards. Now, will not a 
superior position of these rewards — which may well be 
supposed to consist in transcendent dignity of rank, station, 
employment, nearness to the throne, the performance of 
high commissions in heaven and abroad in the universe — 
put a wide separation betwixt many who have been closely 
united on earth, and who would wish to preserve their 
friendship and intercourse for ever? Will a dignified 



74 power in weakness: 

personage, high in honour through the celestial realms, 
descend from his lofty sphere and society to visit and con- 
verse with his former friend, who, far below him in piety, 
dwells in one of the remote celestial villages among the 
common people of heaven ? 

1 ' The Scriptures themselves give us no direct information 
respecting the social constitution of heaven. The whole 
system of life there, apart from devotion, is left to be 
imagined with dim uncertainty. And although they speak 
of it sometimes as a family, sometimes as a festal assembly, 
suggesting the delightful fancy that all its members will be 
easily observed and known, as in such spectacles on earth, 
a little reflection assures us that these are but images, teach- 
ing us indeed what the spirit of heaven will be, but not 
intended to afford us precise and definite information re- 
specting the laws of its intercourse. 

"It is well to see the clfniculties of a great subject : they 
awaken curiosity ; they set the mind to work ; they break 
up the fancies of ignorance, and prepare us to welcome with 
more delight the certainty that may be attained. 

"We are, however, acquainted with two or three facts, 
distinctly established, by the aid of which we may work out 
with luminous certainty many large and beautiful problems 
respecting our social prospects in heaven. Such facts as 
these — the permanent properties of our nature, the certain 
assurance we have that heaven is the world of perfection, 
and those inspired declarations respecting heaven — which, 
although they assert nothing directly of our future mutual 
recognition, or of the mode of celestial intercourse, speak 
of heaven as a social state. Memory is one of the perma- 
nent properties of our nature. Memory will be plainly 
essential for the holy purposes of gratefid adoration ; for 
gratitude is, in its very nature, a sentiment inspired by 
memory. It will be essential to enable us to perceive the 
rectitude of the final judgment. Suppose the memory of 
human actions to be lost, the judgment of our race will 
appear to be a mere act of sovereign despotism. It will 
also be essential to the existence of conscious identity or 



MEMORIALS OF THE EEV. W. RHODES. 75 

continuous "being. That memory is a permanent property 
of nature is, therefore, certain. Now, as our friends are 
closely identified with ourselves, and their words and acts 
constitute a great part, and sometimes are among the most 
important parts of our own history, if we remember our 
own history, if we remember our own past selves, we must 
remember our friends in heaven. 

' ' A second property of our lives which we know will be 
permanent is holy love. There needs no proof that our 
moral affections will be continued. The present graces of 
piety will be the graces of heaven. They will go with us 
wherever we go, and form the temper and felicity of our 
existence. ' Love is of God ; and he that abide th in love 
abideth in God, and God in him. ' ' Love shall never fail. ' 
'Against this, there is no law' to condemn it to death. We 
have seen that our present companions in Christ must 
always be remembered ; we also see that they must always 
be loved; and, in heaven as on earth, it is' in the nature of 
love to seek intercourse with its object. 

' ' Another established fact that will aid us in this inquiry 
is the perfection of the heavenly state. It is true that ' it 
doth not yet appear what we shall be ; ' but we know that 
we shall not be less perfect than we now are. In our in- 
strumental existence, as well as in our character, we shall 
be ' made perfect. ' When Paul writes, ' Whether there be 
tongues, they shall cease ; whether there be knowledge, it 
shall vanish away,' his plain meaning is, that the present 
imperfections of our communication and acquirement of 
knowledge shall vanish. Our knowledge of individuals 
as well as of things and truths will no longer be defective, 
in consequence of an imperfect medium of perception. * Now 
we see in a mirror darkly, but then face to face ; now I 
know in part, but then shall I know even as I am known.' 
Do not these words imply a perfection of means and 
facilities for the attainment of all that knowledge which 
tends to the promotion of holy happiness ; the knowledge 
not only of God, but of His glorified creatures ? 

" The glimpses of the society of the blessed afforded by 



76 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

Scripture, tend to the same conclusion. ' Now I would not 
have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them who 
sleep, that ye may not be grieved as the others are, who 
have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose 
again, so also them that sleep in Jesus will God bring with 
him. Besides, we affirm to you, by the command of the 
Lord, that we the living, who remain at the coming of the 
Lord, shall not anticipate them who are asleep. For the 
Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout 5 with 
the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God : 
and the dead in Christ shall arise first. After they are 
raised, we, the living who remain, shall at the same time 
with them be caught up in clouds to join the Lord in the 
air : and so we shall be for ever with the Lord. Where- 
fore comfort each other with these words. ' ' Then shall the 
King say to those at his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my 
Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the for- 
mation of the world. ' ' And these shall go into eternal life.' 
6 1 assure you that many shall come from the east and from 
the west, and will be placed at table with Abraham, Isaac, 
and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven. ' ' For so there shall 
be richly given to you an entrance into the everlasting 
kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. ' Paul anti- 
cipates in his converts, 'his glory and crown.' 'Every 
man ' shall be '"presented perfect in Christ Jesus, ' by him 
who 'warned and taught him in all wisdom.' In anticipa- 
tion of Christ's appearance, the most touching appeal of 
Christian affection is, ' by our gathering together unto him. ' 
Each of these passages supplies a beautiful social image ; 
with each of them the notion of non-recognition is at least 
very discordant, while that of recognition agrees with all. 
Why is the hope held out to us of joint recognition, joint 
abode, and mutual social delights, if we are to be alike 'un- 
knowing and unknown ' ? Recognition of some kind is 
implied in all these instances ; and can it be a merely col- 
lective recognition? Where, then, would be the consoling- 
force of the language ? 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 1 i 

' i Before these fixed lights of fact and truth, difficulties 
fade almost to nothing. The difficulty, for instance, arising 
from the difference of rewards amongst those who were the 
nearest friends when on earth. We cannot conceive it to have 
any other effect than frequent separation. It may possibly 
impede the constancy of their intercouse, but not by any 
means totally prevent it. It does not do so even in this 
world. Even our greatest modern statesman, so high in 
station and endless in labours, pays a yearly visit to his 
mother in the remote retirement of Westmoreland. I am 
fully convinced, by loug and large meditations upon it, that, 
notwithstanding its transcendent superiority and happiness, 
the society of heaven will, in its social arrangements and 
conduct, bear a much nearer resemblance to that of the 
preseut world than is generally imagined. Suppose that of 
two friends who are now most closely united, and wishing 
to be so for ever, one shall be greatly raised above the other 
in the future kingdom ; this cannot touch in the least the 
ardour of their friendship. The inferior person will feel a 
just and pleasurable exidtation in the dignity of his friend, 
and of course be always ready to meet him with joy; while, 
on the other side, celestial dignity will delight to conde- 
scend, and to impart his lustre and felicity to the object of 
his ancient regard. True piety will always be the same. 
The best Christians, whatever be their station or their 
mental accomplishments, are the most simple, benignant, 
and condescending, simply because they are the best, be- 
cause they have most of the temper of their Saviour. Those 
who are most like Him will be first in heaven, and thus be the 
most affectionate and condescending to their inferior friends, 

' ' Though no doubt heaven will be a state of activity in 
endless forms of service and achievement, there will also be 
a large portion of repose. 'A rest remaineth for the people 
of God.' Whatever will be the employments of the state, 
the long leisure of immortality will afford ample time for 
the indulgence of friendship wherever the affections may 
lead. 



78 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

" And may we not also be permitted to suppose that the 
benignant Saviour, who has felt the affections and prefer- 
ences of friendship on earth, and who will probably retain 
them for ever, and who will preside over the arrangements 
of eternity — may we not suppose that He will show peculiar 
indulgence to this most felicitous affection, and so dispose 
of friends through His celestial empire as to allow them 
free and delightful intercourse for ever ? I have no doubt 
that He "will do this. 

" Thus you perceive there is solid and ample ground for 
cherishing this most soothing anticipation. But to what 
extent may this anticipation be indulged ? Will our inter- 
course be continued with all pious friends, or only with 
some of them ? I believe the answer of the heart to this 
question will be the true answer. Where you wish it to be 
continued, there it will be. The friendship of heaven will, 
from the very nature of friendship, be a matter of choice, or 
rather, an adherence to our present choice. 

" The affectionate veneration for wise and excellent 
parents, and the love of their society which nature inspires 
and piety confirms, will continue for ever. The relation 
betwixt them and us can never be dissolved, never forgotten. 
And as the relation itself is immortal, the tender instincts 
and attachments resulting from it will also be immortal. 
Your parents will be as much your parents a hundred mil- 
lions of long ages hence, in fact and in feeling, as they are 
at this hour. Their care and love in training us to wisdom 
and piety, when the supreme value of these results shall be 
fully perceived, will indefinitely enlarge the sum of our 
obligations, and render them more precious and venerable 
for ever. Then, children in their turn become parents. 
This gives rise to a new affection, which also, from the 
nature of the case, must continue through eternity. This 
opens a beautiful view of the richness and variety of celes- 
tial love — love for glorified parents, love for glorified 
children — in all who are thus blest on both sides of their 
being. 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 79 

' ' Wh.etL.er tLe tenderness of personal attachment sLall 
be continued in tLe world to come, wLen tLe constitution 
of our nature shall be changed, seems at first sight the 
most difficult point to determine in the whole inquiry. 
TLe difficulty arises from its being a mixed affection. TLe 
inferior ingredients of tLe tender affections, and the 
alliances to wLicL tLey lead, Laving answered their pur- 
pose, will be finally extinguished in death ; but it appears 
to me certain that the mental affinity, the tenderness of 
spirit, the intercourse of soul with soul, wLicL are more or 
less experienced in all happy cases of this sort, will remain 
as some of tLe finest elements of tLe life, and will form a 
LigL and everlasting endearment betwixt tbose wLo were 
united in tLe days of time. Milton was as great a philo- 
sopher as a poet. His views of human nature and the 
social affections were tLe most exalted that ever were 
formed. To any one who delights to study the social con- 
stitution of our race, what eloquent wisdom there is in the 
following lines : — 

6 Rail, wedded love 

by thee, 
Founded in reason, loyal, just, and pure, 
Relations dear, and all tLe cLarities 
Of father, son, and brother, first were known. ' 

' ' And can it be supposed that an affection wLicL pro- 
duces a measureless flow of good on earth will lose all its 
charms with the extinction of life, and do nothing to aug- 
ment tLe happiness of eternity ? It is commanded to those 
who bear this relation, at least on one side, to love eacL 
other 'as Christ has loved his church.' The love of the 
Saviour is an immortal love ; and this seems to convey an 
intimation that the other will also be immortal. 

"How infinitely solemn are tLese friendships of personal 
tenderness ! They are frequently so slight and inscrutable 



80 POWER IN WEAKNESS. 

in their commencement that no human thought is tine 
enough to trace them to their origin. The original foun- 
tain lies remote and concealed, among the shades and 
mysteries of our wonderful nature ; no intellectual Bruce 
has ever penetrated to their source. But, like the Nile, 
they flow on and bless, and sometimes desolate. They 
may now to bless or desolate for ever. 

"Do you put this final question on the whole subject, — 
* Who, among all the friends I have ever possessed, will 
have most of my regard through eternity ? ' The answer 
is certain. It will be the person who has done you most 
religious good, who has most drawn down the Divine bene- 
dictions upon you by his prayers, and who has added most 
to the riches of your being, whoever that may prove to be. 
Yes, this is certain, all persons and things will then be 
estimated by this reference to the sovereign Lord of our 
immortality. Let us adopt this standard of estimate 
now /" 



CHAPTER VII. 

"Propose to nie anything out of this Book, and require 
whether I believe it or no, and seem it never so incom- 
prehensible to human reason, I will subscribe it with hand 
and heart, as knowing that no demonstration can be 
stronger than this — G-od has said so, therefore it is true. " — 
Chillingworth. 



LETTERS ON THE DEITY OF JESUS, ADDRESSED TO 
AN INQUIRER. 



I. INTRODUCTORY. 

" Such has been the adoring and happy state of my mind 
towards, the blessed Saviour for many years past, that to 
hold any dispute concerning His nature has seemed to me 
to be an act almost tinctured with impiety— like turning 
adoration into controversy ; but I cannot help telling you, 
in the most honest and affectionate manner, some of my 
views and feelings concerning the religious difference be- 
twixt us. The difference — should you indeed finally em- 
brace the views with which you confess a sympathy — is of 
the most grave and vital nature. 

"Allow me to help you in searching the Scriptures, as 
the source of final and decisive information with regard to 

G 



82 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

these great questions. It will "be my aim to convince you, 
not by reasoning, but by these alone, ' that your faith may 
stand not in the word of man, but in the power of God.' 
It is for you, it is for me, to take the Scriptures in humble 
simplicity and love, — -to remember that they are intended 
for the poor in spirit, and that the most natural and simple 
meaning is sure to be right. You must remember, that the 
highest reason for believing any truth is because God has 
revealed it. Whatever He has affirmed is proved — proved 
by that final testimony in which we must repose, or be 
doomed to wander in perpetual uncertainty. 

' ' Be honest and upright to the Bible. Trust it as a plain, 
sincere, and honest book. God means what he has said. 
This simple maxim, if adhered to, would banish all errors 
from the world. I believe in the divinity of my Saviour, 
because the Bible has declared it in numerous passages 
plain as the first commandment. There is a great want of 
intellectual rectitude, to say nothing of devotional reverence, 
towards the oracles of God. Be honest to this passage : 
' In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with 
God, and the Word was God. All things were made by 
him. The world was made by him. ' There is the doctrine. 
Why do you not believe it on its own sovereign authority ? 
4 The passage is disputed. ' Yes, in three respects. Whether 
' God ' means God — whether ' created ' means created — wJiether 
■ all things ' and ' the world ' mean all things and the world ! 
that is all. One thing is evident. The God of heaven 
cannot speak plainer. I believe what he has said — I hope 
you will. Why not dispute the first verse of the Bible ? 

' ' If the blessed God has given us information respecting 
His own nature, is it wise, is it safe, is it pious, is it re- 
verential, for you to retain a different opinion ? Differ in 
mind from the Father and Lord of our spirit, concerning 
himself ! Read, pray, believe, become a little child before 
His presence ! Do not be too proud to be taught by the 
* Ancient of Days. ' * He gives grace to the humble, but the 
proud he knoweth afar oft'.' 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 83 

*< You object to the doctrine of the Trinity because of its 
mystery- I see all the facts which compose this doctrine 
plainly stated in the Scriptures. They tell me that there 
are distinctions in the Divine nature, and that there is 
unity. This is enough for any one who takes God at his 
word. I am not required to understand the great facts of 
the case, but to believe them on the clear testimony of God 
himself. How do I know that we are immortal; that 
there is a heaven ; that penitent believers will be saved ? 
Simply because God has declared these things. He has 
also declared this doctrine concerning his own nature. 
That it is mysterious is simply nothing against it. Is it 
wonderful that there is mystery in the Supreme nature 
while there is so much in our own ? 

" I cannot answer your questions respecting this sublime 
doctrine. Not one of them is answered in the Scripture, 
whence I gather every ray of knowledge that I have of it. 

4 ' Look at that beautiful flower in your room. Will you 
tell me how it is tinted and coloured by the light — how it 
is enlarged and nourished by the air and soil — how it grows 
into such shapes of grace and enchantment ? You cannot 
answer me. That flower contains an assemblage of mysteries 
as truly transcending all human conception as any truth of 
the Bible ; yet you believe in it — you believe in its growth, 
its beautiful forms, and delicious colours. 

" You are holding a thread in your hand. You have 
philosophy enough to be aware that this thread is composed 
of innumerable atoms finer than your sight can detect. 
How are they held together so as to compose the thread ? 
No mortal has ever fully discovered this. 

"You are, yourself, a body and spirit, mortal and im- 
mortal. There is a broad distinction between these natures, 
yet they are united into one. I can far more easily conceive 
of the perfect union of two spirits, or of three, than of the 
union of such opposite natures in one person. If we hate 
mystery, we must hate ourselves, we must hate all things 
— you must hate your flower. 



84 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

"While all things in the universe are thus teeming with 
mysterious relations and agencies, from the insects that 
people the leaf of a rose and the folds of a violet, up to our 
own wonderfid nature, I confess it has always appeared to 
me to be the last of human presumptions to exclude what 
is mysterious from religion, which in its nature must be 
unspeakably more profound and sublime than the whole 
order of visible things ; from religion, which comprehends 
all the interests of our existence, embraces all the moral 
concerns of time, and will spread its lights and benedictions 
through all the regions and periods of eternity. Higher 
still must be the presumption of attempting to exclude 
mystery from the nature of the blessed and Supreme 
Majesty, the modes of whose existence are beyond the 
reach of created thought, and, compared with whom, 
the whole universe of things and beings is a vain and 
fleeting shadow. Let all our thoughts of the most holy 
God be humble and reverential. When he has been pleased 
to speak of Himself, let us receive every word with grateful 
submission of mind. 

" I regard this most sacred doctrine entirely in a practical 
and consolatory light. That there are three in the Supreme 
nature is never revealed as a mere intellectual fact. They 
are revealed in action for the good of mankind. Each of 
the Divine personages is represented as sustaining a distinct 
office, and performing a distinct part in the glorious*work of 
our salvation. There is not a single sentence of inspiration 
in which we are required to contemplate the Trinity apart 
from this work of saving mercy. The Father so loved the 
world as to send his Son to redeem it. The Son so loved 
the world as to become its Saviour, at the expense of pro- 
found humiliation and sorrow. The Spirit with equal 
benignity condescends to renew our hearts, and to preside 
over the formation of our characters for heaven. Such is 
the inspired view of the doctrine, full of life and grace. 
Thus it is mingled and incorporated with every part of our 
religion ; with its source, its duties, its comforts, its hopes, 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 85 

its promises, as well as its anticipations. No one can give 
consistency and meaning to all the statements of Scripture 
without full belief in this. Let ail these plain statements 
respecting all topics be fully believed, and this doctrine will 
grow out of them. 

1 'The mysteries connected with this doctrine, and the 
divinity of the Saviour, form the grand point of scorn to 
your friends the Soeinians. Yet it is a fact, that they have 
not removed mystery out of the Scriptures in their version ; 
they have only changed its place. They have taken mystery 
out of the doctrines of Scripture, where it was venerable and 
worthy of the majesty of God, and have placed it in the 
language of Scripture, where it is repugnant to the sincerity 
of God. They have made the language abound in mysteries, 
which in its nature has none ; but in the nature of the 
Great Eternal, which must be mysterious to man, they 
will not allow any mystery. The brightest wit that ever 
graced the world never even fancied a greater absurdity 
than this. Read some of the highest descriptions of the 
Saviour, given by inspired writers, in their sense — that he 
was only a man. Is not the language full of mystery ? No 
man, no child, ever used such words for such a purpose. 
It is indeed mysterious that they should have used such a 
pomp and magnificence of glorious language to describe 
what is so simple and plain. The truth is, your friends 
have introduced far greater mysteries into the New Testa- 
ment than they have laboured to exclude from it. My 
conviction is, that the New Testament is either the most 
deceptive and insincere book in the world, or their view 
and rendering of it is perfectly wrong. 

"Then, if Christ be not God, the adoration of Christ 
must be idolatry. Out of this grows another mystery. 
How will you account for the dark fact in the Divine 
conduct, that our religion, which was intended and predicted 
to destroy all idolatry in the world, has spread a wider and 
deeper idolatry than ever prevailed before ? How account 
for it, that the God of love has permitted numberless 



86 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

millions of His holiest and humblest servants, who fervently 
sought illumination from Him, to live and die in this fatal 
sin ? More mysterious still : How can it be consistent with 
the wisdom and sincerity of God to have employed such 
language in His word concerning His Son, as is highly 
adapted to seduce the world into the sin of adoring Him, 
when all this tremendous enormity of delusion might have 
been prevented by inserting in the sacred book one simple 
term which may be found in every Unitarian publication — 
that Christ is nothing more than man ? Mysteries darker 
than these cannot be found under the sun." 



THE MOST LIKELY WAY OF OBTAINING RIGHT VIEWS 

OF JESUS. 

1 ' I am going to recommend to you what appears to me 
to be the best way of studying the great questions which 
now engage your anxious thought — the way in which I 
formed the religious views which I at present hold, and 
confidently expect to hold, with glorious enlargements, 
through all the future periods of my being. 

" 1. Let the Bible be your only authority. While proceed- 
ing in your inquiries, forget, as much as you can, all the 
different opinions of Christians. What are the Socinians 
or the orthodox to you ? Shut them all out of your 
mind. Your soul is God's. You stand alone in His pre- 
sence, in all your obligations to search and receive His 
truth. Say to yourself in reading His word, 'Here am 
I, and here is God, — I wish and pray to know His mind' 
Forget also, as much as possible, the previous decisions 
of your own reason ; for it is not in its province to decide 
here. If you doubt this, it will be useful to form a clear 
conception of what you mean by Reason, and then I 
think you will no longer doubt. When you speak so 
much of reason, what do you really mean ? Do you 
mean your mental faculties, or your opinions formed from 



MEMORIALS OF THE EEV. W. RHODES. 87 

the exercise of those faculties Do you mean reason or 
reasonings t No doubt reason, if perfectly unclouded and 
unbiassed, would see everything within its range of vision 
just as God sees it. But can au mfinite object be within 
the range of finite vision ? and is our reason with regard to 
the holiest themes of thought perfectly unclouded and un- 
biassed by sin ? We know from experience that it is not so ; 
we know that even with regard to questions of limited 
interest we are constantly the victims of error and mistake, 
— that is, our reasonings are wrong ; and why should we 
presume that they will be right with regard to that ' mystery 
of mysteries,' the Divine nature? It will do you much 
good to use the word opinion instead of the word reason. 
You do not know what your reason would see if it existed 
in perfection ; you only know what it sees now. You know 
what your reasonings are, and that on the great question 
before you they are most likely to be wrong. The Bible is 
the revelation which God has, with the utmost solemnity, 
giveu us respecting himself ; and this revelation must, from 
its very nature, be intended to dictate and govern all our 
sentiments on religion. Is reason to rule this rule ? Sub- 
lime audacity ! 

' ' To ascertain the truth of any religious doctrine, we 
have simply to ask this question, — 'What has God said 
respecting it in His word ? ' What He has said is true. If 
we find there occur sentences which ascribe divinity to our 
Saviour, those sentences are not mere proofs of his divinity, 
— they are direct revelations of it. They are fixed and 
immortal as the laws of thought. They may be doubted, 
perverted, avoided, but there they stand. They must be re- 
ceived or rejected; there is no other choice. Search the 
Scriptures in this spirit, and I think you will find there 
revelations, shining in the expanse of revelation, distinct 
and brilliant as the stars of heaven. 

" 2, Carr$- on your inquiries with great reverence and 1 devo- 
tional earnestness. Although many who withhold supreme 
honour from our Lord are intelligent, candid, and generous* 



88 POWER in weakness: 

as friends and companions, they are in their religious in- 
quiries far more remarkable for speculative thought than 
devotional affection ; their intellect predominates over their 
hearts. Religion is with them a mere theme of intellectual 
inquiry, as if he were the best Christian who is the best 
disputant. There is a sad lack of eaxnestness ; they play 
and sport with the things 'which angels desire to look 
into, ' and these sublimities are tossed about as mere mental 
toys. They are far more inclined to frolic in an intellectual 
dance over the plains of religious thought, than to bow, 
veiled in love and reverence, before the throne. Dread, 
above all things, the sin and folly of assimilation to this 
spirit. The Most High refuses to utter His secrets, or unfold 
His glories, to a cold and frivolous caviller. ' The secret of 
the Lord is with them that fear him, and he will show 
them his covenant. ' The great God is not a mere theme of 
thought, a mere subject for the exercise of controversial 
ingenuity. The revelations He has given of himself are 
given solely for devotional and practical purposes ; in a 
devotional and practical spirit, therefore, can we alone 
study them with success. We can never comprehend Him 
with our minds ; we can only hope, with the aid of His 
Spirit, to love Him with all t our hearts. To produce this 
adoring love is the end of all His revelations ; — desire for 
the increase of this love should be the motive of all our 
s earchings. 

' ' 3. There must be much earnest prayer. While your 
mind continues undecided on this first subject of religious 
thought, let me tenderly and solemnly admonish you to 
watch and pray against temptation — temptation to cherish 
your objections, and resist the declarations of Scripture. 
There is a tempter of all souls, and he tempts us on those 
points where there is the greatest probability of success. 
This is no fancy, but an alarming danger, and all the more 
so when not perceived and dreaded. When the doctrine of 
a crucified Saviour was first proclaimed in the world, it was 
scornfully rejected by men of the highest mental caste ; 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 89 

and to what does the apostle ascribe this delusion ? If our 
Gospel be hid, it is hid to those who destroy themselves, 
whose minds the god of this world hath blinded. We may 
be blinded by pride. If you retain your present views, 
take care that you are not influenced and tempted to do so 
by this. There is a high gratification to pride in novelty 
of religious sentiment. In thinking with the multitude 
there is no distinction, but in holding singular opinions 
there may be much. No one feels any pride in eating and 
drinking ; but if any one could live a year without, per- 
haps he would pride himself in it; for he would in this 
respect be original, and altogether distinguished from the 
common crowd. It is usual for a person who thinks differ- 
ently from Christians in general, to consider important 
opinions which differ from his own as the mere result of 
custom and prejudice, however devotionally and laboriously 
they may have been gathered from the Bible ; while his 
own, to be sure, have opened and bloomed in the clear day- 
light of impartiality. I confess to you that I once felt a 
measure of this vanity; but I feel no distinction in my 
present sentiments, but the humble confidence that they 
are pleasing to God, and are accordant with His mind. We 
may be blinded by a strong dislike for the truth : no doctrine 
will be clear and certain to a mind which has a strong dis- 
taste for it, and which has been trained to defend that dis- 
taste with all its power. Here you will fail, if you are 
doomed to fail. For thirty years you have been the com- 
panion of those who regard Christ as an inferior being ; all 
your tastes and feelings have been trained in accordance 
with this view of Him. Settled tastes and affections are 
amongst the mightiest forces of our nature ; they are gene- 
rally victorious over the intellect. Even the richest splen- 
dours of evidence, and the clearest words of God, will not 
necessarily convince us — cannot possibly convince us, when 
these forces resist the conviction. Your judgment may 
indeed be convinced — you may think differently, but you 
will feel as if you had 'the same opinion still.' Your heart 



90 POWER m WEAKNESS I 

must be brought into harmony with the truth, as well as 
your mind, before you can repose in it : the direct influence 
of heaven can alone produce that harmony ; and you must 
pray for that influence. Do try the experiment, my be- 
loved friend; pray for the blessed Sj)irit; and be sure I 
will pray for you, that you may have a heart to love the 
truth for its own sake, that you may fearlessly search for it 
where alone it can be found, and magnanimously embrace 
it, whatever it may prove to be. 

* '4. As you have invited me to a full and frank expres- 
sion of all my mind on this important subject, I venture to 
offer another hint of advice. I venture to say, that your 
constant intercourse with Socinian society appears to me to 
be a habit most unfavourable to the attainment of the truth 
respecting Jesus. You have had a decided complacency in 
their views, but you have never entirely adopted them. 
At present your judgment is in a balancing state, and you 
are beginning to be seriously in earnest for the discovery of 
the truth. At this crisis, it is to my mind peculiarly dan- 
gerous to live in such a social atmosphere. One reason you 
give for it is, that your friends are not so condemnatory in 
their spirit as those who adopt contrary opinions. You 
charge me, for instance, and those who think with me, with 
severe and condemnatory implications from which they are 
free. I do not plead guilty to this charge. I would not 
condemn one of my fellow- creatures ; I love them all too 
much. I believe, indeed, that ' all men should honour the 
Son, as they honour the Father ; ' with less than this I 
deem it unsafe for myself to live or die. Ought I to be 
satisfied for my friend to be in a position which I should 
think unsafe for myself ? and should alarm for my friend 
be construed into a severe and condemnatory implication ? 
Is it not rather the acting of true charity ? It is true, that 
although / do not presume to pass sentence on any human 
being, the truths that I believe do so with direct and awful 
force. All Divine truth must by implication condemn im- 
piety ; and what is impiety, but denying the divinity of the 



MEMORIALS OF THE KEY. W, RHODES. 91 

Being to whom it belongs ? Who can point out any differ- 
ence between the rejection of the Scriptures, and the 
rejection of their chief contents ? And if I devoutly 
believe Jesus to be Divine, and that His achievements as a 
Divine Saviour form the chief contents of the Scriptures, 
how can I regard Socinianism as a harmless intellectual 
speculation? You admit, with me, the inspiration of the 
Bible ; and there nothing is revealed with more burning 
splendour of language than that our salvation is suspended 
on our believing the Gospel. I know not what the Gospel 
is, unless it be the revelation of what the Redeemer is : — 
« He that believeth shall be saved ; he that believeth not 
shall be condemned.' But Socinianism virtually denies this 
revelation, by rejecting the natural and obvious meaning of 
its words. It is a mere system of negations, the art of 
reducing the Gospel into nothing : its riding spirit consists 
of thinking meanly of Christ ; this is its true secret, its 
fatal charm. A mere negative belief can do nothing for us 
under any circumstances. Certainly it cannot save a 
ruined spirit. True piety is nourished by what we believe, 
not by what we deny. It is my conviction that the * 
Saviour, as truly Divine, and as the Sacrifice for our sins, 
is the bread of life — the vital nourishment of souls for 
eternity. Feeling this, my friend, I cannot feel that those 
who reject the most essential contents of the Bible as 
pernicious fictions of the human fancy, are in the same 
condition as those who accept them as their only life. 
There is, in my opinion, a stupendous difference between 
the two cases ; but in stating this opinion, and in stating it 
earnestly, I am surely evincing not a condemnatory spirit, 
but a spirit of love. 

" On the other hand, the non-existence of what you call 
* the condemnatory spirit ' amongst Unitarians is only the 
non-belief of those truths which have a condemnatory as 
well as" a savmg aspect. They hold the innocence of mental 
error, and glory in the position that a man may believe 
what he will, and be safe, provided his life be right. In 



92 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

this sense, and to this extent, it is quite true, as you 
observe, that they are not condemnatory. The fact is this, 
and only this, — they do not believe in those words of God 
which condemn the unbeliever. Yet apart from this I 
venture to say, that in no circle of religionists do you find 
a more condemnatory spirit. Their theory of religion is the 
only one that inspires contempt for the understandings of those 
who do not embrace it. Where else will you meet with 
persons so unjust to the opinions of their opponents, or so 
scornful in their, tone of conversation ? 

"I am not, however, making a charge, but trying to 
correct a mistaken opinion ; an opinion which you lately 
expressed to me, and which you made your reason for 
preferring that society, against the influence of which I am 
anxious to warn you. I love the Socinians as men, but I 
do confess the utmost dread of their system. They are not 
the friends of my Friend, for they despise His peculiar work, 
and deny His distinctive glory. Much intercourse with 
them will, at least, tend to produce in your mind a feeling 
of uncertainty as to what is truth, and a spirit of indiffer- 
ence to the chief doctrines of the Gospel. By hearing 
them frequently disputed in anything but a serious and 
reverential temper, the holy veneration they are suited to 
inspire is impaired, their efficacy on the heart is lost ; you 
will be tempted to make light of their importance, as if the 
circumstance of their being disputed lessened their vital 
solemnity ; or as if a person thinking himself right, were 
the same as being right in the sight of God. As you care 
for your soul, as you wish to be a loyal servant of Christ, 
dread the fascination of such society. Repel the danger by 
this solemn reflection, ' What shall it profit me, if I gain 
the whole world of social delight, and lose my soul by this 
gain ? ' It will be to me a cause of devout gratitude to hear 
that you have escaped beyond the range of the spiritual 
malaria which spreads along the borders of that river of 
death — Socinianism ! 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 93 



THE TITLES APPLIED TO CHRIST IN THE OLD 
TESTAMENT. 

"At the outset of your inquiries into the testimony of 
Scripture, resolve to keep in mind that the certainty of any 
religious truth does not depend upon the quantity of Scrip- 
ture by which it is established. A few explicit statements 
are quite enough. Many passages on a point may enlarge 
our view of it, but do not augment its certainty. 'God 
hath spoken once ; twice have I heard this, that power 
belongeth unto God.' This satisfied David. Our Sovereign 
commanded his followers, ' Let your yes be yes ; your no, 
no.' If the disciple be entitled to belief on one simple 
affirmation, surely his Master is ; surely it is presumption 
to demand more than this from the ' God who cannot lie. ' 

The Title 'Jehovah: 

"Every Hebrew scholar will tell you that this word 
implies self -existence, — He who derives his being from none, 
but gives being to all. 

"The great name Jehovah is exclusively applied to the 
Divine Being. This is sufficiently established by such 
passages as these : — ' I am Jehovah, that is my name, and 
my glory will I not give to another. ' — Isa. xlii. 8. ' That 
men may know that Thou, whose name alone is Jehovah, 
art the Most High over all the earth.' — Ps. lxxxiii. 18. 
' Sing unto God . . . extol him ... by his name 
J ah.' — Ps. lxviii. 4. This is but the abbreviation of Jehovah. 

" He who assumes this name was frequently visible in the 
early ages of history. This is sufficiently established by 
such passages as these : — 'And Jehovah appeared unto 
Abraham on the plains of Mamre.' He came to the tent 
door, as the narrative relates, in the guise of a traveller, 
accompanied by two celestial attendants having a similar 



94 POWER IN" WEAKNESS I 

aspect. Some nameless majesty distinguished Him from His 
companions, so that when they vanished and He alone 
remained, Abraham saw the tokens of His divinity and paid 
Him divine reverence. He several times called himself 
Jehovah, was called so, and as ' the Judge of all the earth ' 
listened to the intercessions of his servant. Gen. xviii. 

" In Exodus xxiv.20, 21, it is written : — 'Then went up 
Moses and Aaron, and Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of 
the elders of Israel, and saw the God of Israel . . . and 
Jehovah said unto Moses, Come up to me in the mount, 
and be there. ' These are but a few instances selected from 
a large number which record the appearance of Jehovah. 

"Sometimes the Divine Personage who thus appeared 
was called the angel Jehovah. It was the angel who 
appeared to Jacob at Penuel, and of whom he said, * I 
have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved' — 
Gen. xxxii. 30. 

"Now let us ask the question, Who was this Divine 
Personage who was seen again and again by the ancient 
worshippers ? Was He the Father ? The only voice that 
can answer this question with authority replies, ' No ; for 
no man hath seen God at any time. ' He is ' the King in- 
visible.' You tell me that a learned and devout friend has 
assured you that the Divine name Jehovah was never given 
to any one except the Father, and you believed him ; but 
he deceived you. He who is called Jehovah, and who 
assures us with all the solemnity of language that this name 
implies His sole Divine supremacy, was frequently seen ; 
but the Father has never been seen. — John i. 18; 1 John 
iv. 12. 

' ' There is no way of escape from a maze of mystery and 
contradiction, but by supposing this Divine name has been 
assumed by the Son. This view receives still further 
sanction from the frequent connexion of the epithet 'angel ' 
with this name. Has the Father been sent as an angel or 
messenger ? then who sent Him ? Has He an official su- 
perior ? then who is that superior ? I is conceivable that 



MEMORIALS OF THE EEV. W. RHODES. 95 

tlie Son may have sameness of nature to the Father, but 
subordination of office ; this is at least in harmony with 
what even you have read in the Scriptures respecting the 
great redemptive scheme : but is the subordination of the 
Father conceivable ? Our conviction is still more completely 
confirmed when we study the lights thrown by the New 
Testament on the application of this title. Let us compare 
some of the statements of the two Books. 

"We are informed that the angel Jehovah, who ap- 
peared to Moses in the bush, was the same angel ' which 
spake to him in the Mount Sinai. '—Acts viii. 30, 35, 38. 

"We are informed that the angel Jehovah, who ap- 
peared on 'Mount Sinai,' was the same who afterwards 
ascended on high and received gifts for men. ' The chariots 
of God are twenty thousand, even thousands of angels ; 
Jehovah is amongst them as in Sinai, in the holy place. 
Thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive : 
thou hast received gifts for men.' — Ps. lxviii. 17. 

" We are informed that He who thus ascended was Christ. 
1 But unto every one of us is given grace according to the 
measure of the gift of Christ. For he (David) saith, When 
he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave 
gifts unto men. Xow that he ascended, what is it but that 
he also descended? He that descended is the same that 
also ascended.'— Ephes. iv. 7, 9. Then Christ is Jehovah. 

"Take another passage : — 'I saw the Lord sitting upon 
a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. 
. . . . And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, 
holy, holy is Jehovah of hosts : the whole earth is full of 
his glory.' — Isa. vi. We have already been assured by the 
highest authority, that no man has ever seen the Father ; 
then if Isaiah did not see the Son of God, he saw no Divine 
personage. We cannot doubt, therefore, that this was a 
vision of our Saviour's uncreated glory ; but the words of 
the evangelist add certainty to certainty. ' These things 
said Isaiah, when he saw his glory, and spake concerning 
him.' ' ^Nevertheless there w T ere several even of the 



96 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

magistrates who believed on him.' — John xii. 41, 42. Then 
Christ is Jehovah. 

" 'To Jehovah of hosts himself pay holy homage : even 
him yonr fear, and him your dread. And he shall be for 
a sanctuary ; but for a stone of stumbling and for a rock of 
offence to both the houses of Israel.' — Isa. viii. 13, 14. 
In 1 Peter ii. 6, 8, also in Romans ix. 32, 33, we rind this 
prediction applied to Christ : He therefore is Jehovah of 
hosts. 

" 'Prepare the way of Jehovah, make straight in the 
desert a highway for our God.' — Isa. xl. 2. John the 
Baptist said in distinct reference to Jesus, ' I am he whose 
voice proclaims in the wilderness, Make straight the way 
of the Lord. ' — John i. 23. 

"I intended to make some remarks on the term l Lord,'' 
which is so often found in the New Testament. The 
original word is the same that is uniformly employed in the 
Greek translation of the Old Testament for ' Jehovah. ' In 
more than five hundred applications of this word to our 
Saviour in the apostolic writings, it appears to me to be 
used as perfectly equivalent to Jehovah. I judge thus, not 
from the meaning of the word, which is very indefinite, 
but from the circumstances of grandeur, dominion, power, 
and mercy by which it is surrounded. These invest it with 
Divine significance. Pray take the Concordance, and search 
for some of these instances. 

The King of Israel. 

" The King of Israel is the theme of most of the Psalms. 
They rapturously unfold His glory, describe His govern- 
ment, predict His victories, address Him in melting prayer 
or stately strains of praise. Let me give you a few speci- 
mens. ' Give ear to my words, Jehovah, consider my 
meditation. Hearken to the voice of my cry, my King and 
my God ; for unto thee will I pray. My voice shalt thou 
hear in the morning.' (v.) 'My heart labours with a 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 97 

goodly theme; I address my performance to the King. 
. . . Thy throne, God, is for ever and ever.' (xlv.) 
' I will also praise thee with the psaltery, even thy truth, 
my God : unto thee will I sing with the harp, thou 
Holy One of Israel. ' (Ixxi. ) ' For Jehovah is our defence, 
and the Holy One of Israel is our King.' (lxxxix.) ' 
God, when thou wentest forth before thy people, thou didst 

march through the wilderness When the 

Almighty scattered kings. . . . The chariots of God 
are twenty thousand, even thousands of angels ; Jehovah is 
among them, as in Sinai the holy. Thou hast ascended on 
high, thou hast led captivity captive, thou hast received 
gifts for men. ' (lxviii. ) ' That they might set their hope 
on God ... in the daytime he led them with a cloud, 
and all the night with a light of fire. . . . They turned 
back, and tempted God, and limited the Holy One of Israel.' 
(lxxviii. ) ' Sing unto Jehovah a new song. . . . Let 
the heavens rejoice . . . let the fields be joyful before 
Jehovah ; for he cometh, for he cometh to govern the earth : 
he shall govern the world with righteousness, and the 
people by his truth. Jehovah reigneth; let the earth 
rejoice. The heavens declare his righteousness, and all the 
people behold his glory. Worship him, all ye gods. . . . 
Sing unto Jehovah with the harp . . . make a joyful 
noise before Jehovah the King ... for he cometh to 
govern the earth.' (xcvi. — xcviii.) 'Hear my prayer, 
Jehovah. When Jehovah shall build up Zion, he shall 
appear in his glory. I said, my God, take me not away 
in the midst of my days. ... Of old hast thou laid 
the foundations of the earth ; and the heavens are the work 
of thine hands.' (cii.) 'Bless Jehovah, my soul. He 
made known his conduct to Moses, his performance to the 
children of Israel.' (ciii.) 'I will extol thee, my God, 
King ; and I will bless thy name (adore and celebrate thy 
perfections) for ever and ever. Every day will I bless thee ; 
and I will praise thy name for ever and ever.' (cxlv.) 
' All thy works shall praise thee, Jehovah, and thy saints 

H 



98 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

shall bless thee. They shall speak of the glory of thy 
kingdom, and talk of thy power. . . . Praise ye 
Jehovah. Let Israel rejoice in Him that made him : let 
the children of Israel be joyful in their King.' (cxlix. ) 

"'Who is this King of glory?' — this great and sacred 
Personage, whose perfections wake up the harps of inspira- 
tion to such lofty music. In the most clear and discrimi- 
nating terms, the New Testament informs us. Take one 
instance. At the commencement of our Saviour's public 
life, Nathaniel, astonished at the proof of his omniscience, 
displayed on seeing him when he was secluded from all 
merely human sight, said to Him, 'Rabbi, thou art the 
Son of God, thou art the King of Israel!'' This great 
confession was received with sacred complacency. ' Jesus 
answered him, Because I saw thee under the fig-tree, be- 
lievest thou ? Thou shalt see greater things than these. ' 

"It is a very manifest truth, that the Son of God, the 
frequently visible Jehovah, held the supremacy over the 
worship and government of the chosen nation, as much as 
He does over the Christian church. As the Supreme, He 
is celebrated by the Psalmist. We may say of them what 
Pliny said of the earliest Christians, — ' They sing hymns of 
praise to Christ as God.' If you delight to meet your 
Saviour wherever He appears in His own word, then, in 
the pure unshaded majesty of His perfection, you may often 
meet and adore Him in the Psalms ; for ' He is the Son of 
God, He is the King of Israel. ' 

IV. 
ARGUMENTS FROM THE NEW TESTAMENT. 

"Amongst the many revelations, the full development 
of which is peculiar to the New Testament, is this, that 
Christ is the Maker and Preserver of the Universe. In 
pursuing our inquiries in this second and final volume of 
inspired instruction, still keep in view the axiom, that the 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 99 

certainty of a religious truth, depends on the distinctness, 
not on the frequency, of its announcement. Open the book 
of Genesis. You believe in a moment the wonderful fact 
announced in the first verse : — ' In the beginning God 
created the heavens and the earth. ' Open the Epistle to 
the Hebrews ; and, in the first chapter, you read of the 
Saviour : — ' He laid the foundations of the earth, and the 
heavens are the work of His hands. ' Why not believe this 
as well as the former, even if no other passage made the 
same declaration? They are equally distinct in their 
language, and imperial in their authority ; the only dif- 
ference is, that what is stated in the one with simple 
brevity, is stated in the other with magnificent eloquence. 
This, however, is not the solitary instance in which the 
assertion is made. In John i. 3, in Col. i. 16, we have 
similar assertions made, in terms equally decisive. 

' ' Perhaps you reply to this, that the Lord Jesus perf ormed 
the work of creation by the power of the Father. This, 
however, is never asserted in the Scriptures. You quote in 
support of your explanation the passage in Heb. i. 1 : — 'By 
whom also he made the worlds ; ' but observe, it is im- 
mediately said in addition, 'that the Son upholds all things 
by His own power. ' 

"Xow, to create and uphold nature are not two distinct 
and unconnected things ; they are but different parts or 
stages of one work : only by a continuance of the creative 
act does God uphold creation ; for all nature, in its living 
growing, exquisitely moving machinery, is a perpetual 
response to the creating voice. A flower arrests your 
attention at this moment. Is not that flower a creation ? 
Yet it is no antiquity, — it did not open at the creative word 
six thousand years ago ; it sparkled into beauty only an 
hour since, called forth by this morning's light and dew. 
The Creator has only just made it, and He made it while 
in the act of carrying on that work which is described 
as 'upholding all things by the word of His power.' 
The similar expression in Ephesians iii. 9, must, if 



100 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

genuine, have a similar meaning; but its inspiration is 
doubtful. The words ' by Jesus Christ ' are wanting in all 
the greatest manuscript authorities, and I rind Griesbach 
excludes them from the text as unquestionably spurious. 

* ' Perhaps you are still unconvinced, and reply that many 
inspired sentences ascribe the work of creation to the 
Father. This is true, and how, therefore, on your principle, 
can you defend the Scriptures from the charge of incon- 
sistency? On my principle, the explanation is easy. I 
explain them by the words of our Lord, — 'I and my 
Father are one. ' The Father and the Son are so identical 
in nature, that what is done by the one is done by the 
other. ' Whatsoever things the Father doth, the same doth 
the Son likewise. ' 

"Perhaps you say, with some of your good friends, ' But 
may not the perfections exerted by Him in creating - the 
universe have been imparted to Him by the Father ? ' 
You should fearlessly trace out such a sentiment to its 
logical conclusion. Pause for a moment to think on the 
small section of the universe that comes within the sweep 
of our faculties ; the mysterious amplitude even of this 
comparatively fractional part ; the vast and brilliant multi- 
tude of wonders that adorn it ; each rolling star, each 
microscopic atom ; the hints of infinity, and mysteries of 
enchantment, which the sciences of chemistry, of light, and 
of vital growth discover in each tiny leaf and trembling 
thread of vegetation. Think of life, its essence, its intricate 
and infinite varieties, histories, and destinies, — unconscious 
life, material life ; the life of thought, life in the wavering- 
insect, life in the glorious ' son of the morning ; ' and then 
ask yourself what higher conception of an infinite mind you 
can form than that which is by these things suggested ! 
What do we mean by God, unless we mean Him ' in whom 
is life,' ' who created all things, and without whom nothing 
was made, that was made'? Surely we do not need a 
prophet to tell us that c he who built all things is God.' 
If the creation do not prove the being of God, there is no 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 101 

such proof in existence. The Bible itself does not prove it, 
but assumes it as manifest from His works. But you, in 
your zeal to deny the existence of a Trinity in the Divine 
nature, are willing to believe in a plurality of gods ; for you 
are ready to contend that the Creator of the universe was 
a created, inferior being, — that the Maker of all things was 
himself made ! 

"Passing by, for the present, the other titles ascribed to 
our Saviour by the writers of the New Testament, let us 
examine what He himself taught concerning His own 
nature. The accomplished Dr. Priestley was fond of 
asserting, as his chief argument against the popular doctrine, 
that Christ did not teach His own divinity. It certainly 
must be admitted by every candid student of the G-ospels 
that He did not teach this doctrine in the explicit and 
luminous terms in which some of His apostles were after- 
wards inspired to declare it. Whatever reasons induced 
Him to pursue such a plan of slow and gradual revelation, 
the fact is plain that He maintained great reserve respecting 
himself. When the disciples confessed their belief that He 
was the Messiah, the Son of the living G-od, He strictly 
commanded them not to disclose it. We can perceive some 
of His reasons for keeping in the shades of this comparative 
obscurity. For instance, had He proclaimed himself, in 
distinct language to be 'God over all, blessed for ever,' 
and accompanied it with a splendid profusion of evidence 
which woidd have compelled conviction in the hearts of all, 
He would have plainly defeated His grand end in coming 
into the world ; for had men fully known Him, ' they 
would not have crucified the Lord of glory.' Another 
reason was this, — even His most enlightened attendants, 
and much less the people at large, were not prepared to 
receive full revelations of His supremacy, nor of some other 
doctrines of His religion. He explicitly assured them in 
His last discourse, that much was reserved to be com- 
municated by future teachings of His Spirit. 'I have- 
many things still to tell you, but you cannot yet bear them. 



102 POWEK IN WEAKNESS : 

But when the Spirit of truth is come, he will conduct you 
into all the truth. . . . He will glorify me ; for he will 
receive of mine what he shall communicate to you. . . . 
He will teach you all things, and remind you of all that I 
have told you.' John xvi. 12 — 14. It is true that the 
disciples frequently paid Him the honours of worship, but 
it is probable that, although the act was right, the motive 
inspiring it was but faintly enlightened. It was the 
obscure, instinctive, involuntary, unreasoning worship of 
gratitude and reverence ; but while they were paying it to 
Christ, perhaps the idea that He was God did not occupy 
their minds. Their thoughts, if they thought at all, 
terminated on a human prophet, or an angelic being in the 
guise of human nature. They were entertaining the Lord 
of angels miawares ; they did not fully know the glory of 
the Being in whose presence they stood, and their adora- 
tions rose to a higher object than they had contemplated; 
but as He had a right to them, He received thern, forgiving 
imperfections, not quenching the * smoking flax ; ' reserving 
more complete and critical enlightenment until His visible 
presence should be withdrawn, and the Spirit should be 
given to unfold His real nature, and shed new meaning and 
beauty on those words of His, which they had already 
heard, but only imperfectly understood. 

"Admitting, therefore, with you, that His teachings re- 
specting His own nature were, for wise reasons, partial, and 
wear an air of reserve, let us devoutly study His blessed 
words, that we may know what He actually did teach. 

"The Lord Jesus avowed himself to be the Messiah. 
Then of course, in claiming this great title, He claims all the 
distinctions which are ascribed to it in the predictive Scrip- 
tures. These predictions constantly speak of the Messiah 
as a Divine Personage. I will cite only two. ' His name 
shall be called "Wonderful, Counsellor, The Mighty God, The 
Father of the everlasting age, The Prince of Peace.' — Isaiah 
ix. 6. The last of the prophets thus announced His coming : 
'The Lord whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to His 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 103 

temple, even the angel of the covenant, whom ye delight 
in. ' — Mai. iii. 1. Here the Messiah is denominated by one 
of the supreme names, ' the Lord ; ' and it is also said that 
the temple is His, which every one knows was consecrated 
to Jehovah alone. 

' ' He frequently declared that He existed before He came 
into the world. ' Jesus said unto them, Yerily verily, I say 
unto you, Before Abraham existed I am. ' . . . 'I 
descended from heaven.' . . . 'From the presence of 
the Father, I came into the world. ' — John viii. 8. 

" He taught that He existed in glory with the Father before 
the world was. ' And now, Father, glorify thou me in thine 
own presence with the glory which I had with thee before 
the world was.' — John xvii. 5. 

' ' He taught that He possessed the right to pardon sins. 
4 Jesus said to the paralytic, Sou, take courage ; thy sins 
are forgiven thee. And some of the Scribes said in them- 
selves, Why doth He thus speak blasphemies ? Who can 
forgive sins but God alone ? But Jesus knowing their 
thoughts said, Why do ye think evil in your hearts ? For 
which is the easier, to say, Thy sins are forgiven ; or to say, 
Arise and walk ? But that ye may know that the Son of 
man upon earth hath the right to forgive sins, He saith to 
the paralytic, Arise, take up thy couch, and go to thy 
house.' — Matt. ix. 1 — 6. The common sentiments of man- 
kind and the declarations of Scripture concur to assure us, 
beyond all question, that the pardon of sins is the solemn 
prerogative of the Eternal King. The nature of that great 
act renders this perfectly certain, for it consists in the 
removal of the legal impediments to pardon, so as to render 
it an act just as it is merciful ; it implies a change in the 
Eternal mind from sentiments of awful displacency to those 
of delighted love ; it includes a mighty change in the cha- 
racter and prospects of the pardoned spirit, — a change that 
will suffer no reverse through the days of eternity. Thus 
manifest it is that none but He who presides over the moral 
arrangements of the universe can forgive sins. Hence the 



104 power in weakness: 

ascriptions of the prophet, ' He pardoneth iniquity, trans- 
gression, and sin. ' ' Who is a God like unto thee, that 
pardoneth iniquity?' 'He retaineth not His anger for 
ever, because He delighteth in mercy.' 

"He taught that He ivas the Lord of David. 'When 
the Pharisees were assembled, Jesus asked them, What 
think ye of the Messiah, — whose son should He be ? They 
answered, David's. He replied, How then doth David, 
speaking by inspiration, call Him his Lord? The Lord, 
said he, said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand, until I 
make thy foes thy footstool. If the Messiah were David's 
son, would David call Him his Lord ? To this none of them 
could answer ; and from that day, nobody presumed to try 
Him with questions. ' And who can answer this reasoning ? 
The argument is perfect. David calls the Messiah by one 
of the supreme names, and confesses Him to be his God. 
Let any one read the Psalms and the history of David, and 
see if he acknowledges any one to be his Lord, except 
Jehovah. — Ps. ex. 1 ; Matt. xxii. 45. 

"He declared himself to be the giver oj eternal life. — 
John x. 28. This includes an infinite train and assemblage 
of blessings, as is obvious to the slightest reflection. It 
implies the forgiveness of sins, and the renovation of the 
nature. It implies not only the formation of holy character, 
but such an absolute control over all visible and invisible 
agencies by which that character is affected for good or ill, 
as will preserve it from all moral dangers in time or eter- 
nity. To confer such blessings ou one soul, much more on 
the millions of the saved, implies a wisdom, power, and 
munificence truly divine. 'I give unto them eternal life.' 
Suppose this transcendent promise shone grandly on the 
sacred page, just as it now does, but that no circumstances 
around it determined who the speaker was. Would not all 
questioners of our Lord's divinity ascribe it to the Father ? 
They would point to the majesty of the declaration, the 
independence of its tone, the infinity of the good which it 
pledges, and the perfect dominion it implies over the whole 



MEMORIALS OF THE KEY. W. RHODES. 105 

nature and history of all spirits, in all scenes, through all 
duration ; — they would point to these as irresistible proofs 
that the promise was made by the Supreme Being. They 
would confirm the interpretation by the words of the 
apostle, that ' eternal life is the gift of God. ' — Rom. v. I 
believe this reasoning would be just and decisive. But — 
Christ gives this promise. 

"He taught that He was the 'Son of the living God.' 
Some suppose this to imply a relation to God like that 
which all men sustain ; others think it simply an official 
term denoting the Messiah. I believe the term expresses 
the supremely Divine nature, and that for the following 
reasons out of many others : — 

"1. When Peter confessed that Jesus was the Messiah, 
the Son of the living God, our Lord said to him, ' Blessed 
art thou, Simon, son of Jonas : for flesh and blood hath not 
revealed this unto thee ; but my Father who is in heaven. ' 
It certainly does not require a special revelation from heaven 
to prove that a man is a man : it certainly requires no such 
revelation to convince any one who had already seen the 
evidential works of Jesus, that He was the Messiah. Peter 
evidently meant to declare more than this. Whether he 
understood the full import of his own declaration is quite 
another question. 

"2. When the Jews affirmed that by calling God His 
Father, He ' had made himself equal with God,' He did not 
deny it, as every sentiment of truth and reverence would 
have instantly impelled Him to do, if it had not been true ; 
but, on the contrary, He broadly confirmed the lofty impu- 
tation. By confirming it, He makes their meaning of His 
words His own meaning. Hence they have precisely the 
same force as if He had said, 'I am equal with God, — I am 
God.'— John v. 18. 

' ' 3. The Jews said of Him, ' We have a law, and by that 
law He ought to die ; because He made himself the Son of 
God.' This law against blasphemy is defined with the 
utmost precision in Leviticus xxiv. 15, 16 : — ' Whosoever 



106 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

curseth his God shall bear his sin. And he who blasphem- 
eth the name of Jehovah shall surely be put to death.' 
Two forms of this awful sin are here expressed. It was 
committed by a man saying anything by which the majesty 
of God is insulted ; or by assuming to himself the perfec- 
tions or honours which belong to God alone. The Saviour 
offended against this law, is the solemn opinion of the 
Sanhedrim ; but in what sense ? In no possible sense but 
by assuming to himself the perfections and honours of God, 
in declaring himself to be the Son of God. Did the blessed 
Jesus tell them that they had mistaken His meaning ? He 
did not. He was silent ; and suffered death under that 
charge ; yes, He died for it. The conclusion is simple and 
refulgent as light. He who dwelt in that weak and suffer- 
ing form, as in a shrine, was God ; and He himself declared 
the wonderful secret, not at that time, indeed, by words, 
but by an action which speaks louder than words the most 
eloquent and startling — by the sacrificial action completed 
on the cross ! — Matt. xxvi. 63 — 65. 

1 ' Judging from the various connexions in which we read 
the Saviour's claim to this relation, I can only understand 
the title, ' Son of God, ' to signify identity with the Divine 
nature. This identity or sameness He sets in many lights, 
and makes it the theme of frequent affirmations. He claims 
sameness in moral glory : — ' If ye had known me, ye would 
also have known my Father : and from this time ye know 
him, and behold him. Philip saith to him, Lord, show us 
the Father, and that will be the sum of happiness to us. 
Jesus replied, So long a time am I among you, and dost 
thou not yet understand me, Philip ? He who beholdeth 
me, beholdeth the Father ; how then sayest thou, Show us 
the Father ? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, 
and the Father in me ? . . . He that hath seen me, 
hath seen the Father. ... I and my Father are one.' 
— John xiv. 7 — 10. Sameness as the source of spiritual 
enjoyment in the souls of His people: — 'If a man love me, 
he will observe my word ; and my Father will love him, 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 107 

and we will come to him, and make our abode with him. ' — 
John xiv. 23. Sameness in possession : — ' All mine are 
thine, and thine are mine.' — John xvii. 10. Sameness in 
knowledge : — 'He showeth to him all things which he him- 
self doeth. ' — John v. 20. What less than infinite capacity 
can receive infinite intelligence ? Sameness in purpose : — 
' The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the 
Father doing.' — v. 19. Sight is put, as is common in the 
Scriptures, for mental perception. Sameness in operative 
power : — ' For what things soever he doeth, these things 
the Son also doeth in like manner.' — v. 20. The Saviour 
had already asserted that the perpetuity of His operations 
as to time was the same as those of the Father : — c As the 
Father worketh until now, I also work.' He now affirms 
the same as to the extent of His operations. The works 
of the Father, as to their nature, extent, mode, time of 
performing them, are equally the works of the Son. Then 
He must have the same perfections. Sameness in the right 
to honour: — 'That all men may honour the Son as they 
honour the Father. He who honoureth not the Son, 
honoureth not the Father who sent him.' — v. 23. This is 
the fixed law of heaven. Honour to the Father will not be 
accepted, unless the same be rendered to the Son. What- 
ever mortals may think, we are told that, in the estimation 
of the Eternal mind, the neglect of one is the neglect of 
both. 

"It is true that, in nearly all the passages from which 
these testimonies are extracted, two sets of characters are 
official subordination to the Father, which He had con- 
ascribed by our Saviour to hiinseif ; various characters of 
descended to appropriate as the Saviour of men; and 
various characters of supremacy, which imply sameness of 
Divine nature. The consideration of the former I reserve ; 
the consideration of the latter is alone my present object. 
It will save you from much perplexity, if you adhere to the 
simple rule of keeping distinct in your own mind things 
which are kept distinct in the Scriptures ; — what is said of 



108 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

our Saviour as to His humanity, which He assumed ; and 
what is said of Him as to His divinity, which was natural 
to Him ; — and if we do this, — if we regard language as the 
vehicle and not the veil of meaning, — it seems to me to be 
impossible to resist the conclusion that the language used 
by Jesus respecting himself is a revelation of His Divine 
nature. The idea seems to shine through it like a glorious 
light through a pure transparency. Remember, that we 
cannot even take the lowest view of Him that has ever been 
suggested, — we cannot even regard Him as a mere Hebrew 
Socrates, we cannot even accord to Him the title of a good 
man, — unless He uttered the truth. The truth of our 
religion, with all its eternity of consolations, is suspended 
on the fact that Jesus spoke the truth ; and it seems to me 
that we must either deny His truthfulness, or believe His 
divinity. 

"That there are great difficulties connected with this 
lofty doctrine, I allow. Every great intellectual topic, 
though unspeakably inferior to this, has its incidental 
difficulties. Every high mountain, whether in the world 
of matter or of thought, casts a deep shade across the plain 
below. But there should be a great difference in the effect 
produced upon us by the difficulties which result from want 
of ample proof of a thing, and the difficulties resulting from 
the sublimity of the thing itself. I hope you will, one day, 
admit that only the latter class of difficulties perplex the 
solemn doctrines you now desire to understand. Such 
difficulties should inspire, not doubt, but reverence. Culti- 
vate the awe which Moses felt when he turned to behold 
the 'great sight.' Reflect, that if the Saviour be the true 
God, the revelations respecting Him are but mere hints 
and glimpses of His infinitude ; and how shall mortal man, 
by searching, find out God ? These revelations have some 
resemblance to the revelations of astronomy. Since Newton 
discovered the true idea of the universe, his followers have 
been labouring to give harmony and perfection to his 
system. Much remains to be done. They act like honest 



MEilOKIALS OF THE EEV. W. RHODES. 109 

men. They display a noble intellectual rectitude. They 
never doubt the facts already ascertained, because these 
facts are perplexed by difficulties arising from the facts of 
which they are ignorant. ' It is the little which we know,' 
said the dying Laplace ; ' it is the great that remains un- 
known;' yet he fully believed that when the remoter 
portions of the universe are opened, if they ever shall be, 
to our observation, they will be found to harmonize with 
what has been discovered already. 

"A greater than the universe is here! The Creator 
himself is claiming our praise, and an entire universe of 
glowing and breathing splendours is but the faint reflection 
of His glory. Study Him, at least, with the confidence 
and veneration which you apply to the study of His works. 
Believe what is clearly revealed of Him which you can 
understand ; believe that which you cannot understand is 
in harmony with what is known. Will you be less devout 
towards your Saviour, than the infidel astronomers towards 
the stars ? Will you say, ' I will not believe this or that 
sentence of inspiration, although it is clear as the day, 
because I cannot understand how it agrees with others?' 
If the Eternal Spirit dictated them all, all will one day be 
found to harmonize ; while you wait on God, that harmony 
will become every day more perceptible, and in the world 
of infinite discovery it will be perfect." 



The next letter is an examination of certain 
passages of Scripture which had been quoted in 
support of the opinions entertained by his corre- 
spondent. 

^ 

"You mention several texts which give you great per- 
plexity ; indeed, make you despair of attaining satisfaction. 
I will briefly notice them, in the hope of relieving your 
mind. 



110 POWEK IN weakness: 

' ' The Saviour's reply to the young ruler. * Why callest 
thou me good? There is none good, save one, that is God.'' — 
Matt. xix. 17. Suppose a man who does not think me a 
true Christian, but has a high respect for my opinion, 
should come to me, and say, ' You are a good man ; I wish 
you would tell me the way to be happy. ' I answer him, 
'Why do you call me good? True Christians alone are 
good. ' I put the question to lead him to serious reflection 
on his own words in calling me good, while he did not think 
me a real Christian. I make the assertion that Christians 
alone are good, to induce him to think of them. Now would 
any one be so absurd as to say that I have denied myself 
to be a real Christian ? I have done no such thing. I have 
neither denied or affirmed anything of myself. I have 
simply afhrmed that true Christians alone are good. This 
exactly resembles what took place between Christ and this 
young man. ' Good teacher, what good must I do to obtain 
eternal life? Why callest thou me good? God alone is 
good ! ' It is asserted that Christ in these words denied 
himself to be God. He has done no such thing, — not a 
shade of it. He put a question for a certain purpose ; He 
made a declaration concerning God for a certain purpose ; 
but He neither anirmed or denied anything concerning 
himself. It is an awful desecration of this venerable 
language, and an amazing act of injustice to it, to turn this 
question of our Lord into an assertion — as if He had said, ' I 
am not good, — I am not God.' 

' The Son can do nothing of himself.'' — John v. 19. 

"This, to my utter amazement, you adduce as a decisive 
objection to my views. You take it away from the sentence 
on winch its import depends, and treat it as an independent 
declaration to the effect that the Saviour can no nothing by 
His own power. The whole text is as follows : — 'The Son 
can do nothing of himself, but as he seeth the Father do : 
for what things soever he doeth, such doth the Son like- 
wise. ' 



MEMORIALS _ OF THE REV. W. RHODES. Ill 

"Imagine, if you can, my mind to be miraculously 
heightened and expanded, so that I become like my friend 
Foster. I write you a paper in his style. You blame me 
for it. I defend myself in this way : — 'I am so identified 
with him in thought, feeling, and taste, that as my friend 
has hitherto written, so I write. Indeed, there is such a 
sympathy between us, and I am so thoroughly imbued with 
his spirit, that I can write nothing of myself, but what I 
see him write ; for what things soever he writes, such do I 
write. ' You might in such a case be amazed at my pre- 
sumption, but you woidd never even fancy that I asserted 
in these words that I had power to write nothing ; and my 
obvious meaning would be, that having a sameness of mind 
and character with him, I had power to write nothing 
which bore not the marks of that sameness. 

' ' This illustration is a feeble one, but it may serve to 
make the text in question somewhat clearer. That text, 
however, means more than this. It is a transcendent 
declaration not merely of sympathy between Jesus and the 
Father, not merely of likeness, but of perfect and absolute 
unity. So far from disclaiming power, He asserts with all 
the force of language that His power is such, His nature 
such, that He cannot by the very necessity of His nature 
work any but the works of God. 

iCi The Father is greater than /.' — John xiv. 28. You 
think this text invincibly against me ; but muse upon it for 
a moment. It must surely strike any reflective mind as a 
wonderful declaration. "Would any man who has a sense 
of the majesty of God — would any of the seraphim who 
veil their faces before the uncreated Light, calmly say of 
the King eternal, ' He is greater than I ' ? Impossible ! 
To use such a term of comparison would indeed be the final 
stage of insane presumption. 

' ' But you ask, What did the Saviour mean by this 
sentence, if He meant not an acknowledgment of inferiority ? 
In order to ascertain what He meant, let us keep in mind 
that this declaration must be in accordance with all the 



112 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

other sacred declarations respecting Him ; we must en- 
deavour to recall tliem to our memory, and ' compare 
spiritual things with spiritual. ' Guided by their light, we 
find that the Father is not greater than the Son in Divine 
names. All of these which possess any peculiar significance 
are applied by the Scriptures with equal frequency to both. 
The Son is called by all the titles of divinity, except by the 
title of ' Father. ' Nor is He greater in any of the perfec- 
tions belonging to the Maker of the universe ; for the Son, it 
is declared, is the Maker of it. ' What things soever the 
Father doeth, such things doth the Son in the same manner.' 
Nor is He greater in the attributes of moral glory. 'He 
that hath seen me, hath seen the Father.' Nor is He 
greater as the source of religious blessings. ' I give unto 
them eternal life. ' ' He is the author of eternal salvation to 
all that obey him.' 'Looking to the mercy of our Lord 
Jesus Christ for eternal life.' This is all sacred and in- 
spired theology. What remains, then, of superior great- 
ness in the Father to give significance to these words? 
This remains, — official supremacy in the mediatorial dis- 
pensation. Here the Father is greater than the Son. He 
condescended to become the servant of the Father during 
His abode on earth ; He acknowledged His sovereign au- 
thority, and obeyed Him in all things. This sense of the 
phrase perfectly flows with the current of our Lord's 
discourse. He had just told them that He would request 
the Father to give them another teacher after He himself 
was gone, even the Holy Spirit, who was not to be given 
until Jesus was glorified. ' If ye loved me, ye would rejoice 
that I go to the Father ; because my Father is greater than 
L' What was there in the Father's greater authority 
to make them rejoice because their Saviour was going to 
Him ? Simply this : — It was the Father's will that the 
Spirit should not be given until the Saviour had ascended 
to heaven. ' It is for your good that I depart, for if I do 
not depart, the Teacher will not come to you.' This, theD, 
I believe to be the precise and full meaning of the verse, 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 113 

8 If ye loved me, ye would wish for the Holy Spirit to come 
and reveal my glory:' — 'If ye thus loved me, ye would 
rejoice that I go to my Father ; for my Father is greater in 
authority than I ; and He will not send His Spirit till I go 
to Him.' This official supremacy of the Father is plainly 
and abundantly declared, while every other character of 
Divine greatness is equally declared of the Son. 

"Your next perplexity arises from the following passage *. 
— ' Then the end, when He shall deliver up the kingdom to 
God, even the Father ; when He shall have destroyed all 
government, and all authority and power. For He must 
reign, till He has put all the enemies under His feet. The 
last enemy, death, shall be destroyed. For He has subjected 
all things under His feet. Now, when it (8th Psalm) saith 
that all things are subjected, manifest it is, that He is ex- 
cepted, who has subjected all things to Him. Now, when 
all things are subjected to Him then, even the Son himself 
shall be subjected to Him, that God may be all in all.' — 1 
Cor. xv. 2<^— 28. 

" Suppose we admit, for the sake of argument, that this 
single expression does, by inference, seem to teach the 
essential inferiority of the Son; remember that we have 
already seen that His essential divinity is established by 
many other expressions, not by inference, but by the 
plainest announcement. He is the Jehovah, the mighty 
God, the Creator of all things, the omniscient, immutable, 
everlasting King. ISTow, it is a sacred law in the interpre- 
tation of passages that we should judge the few by the 
many, not the many by the few ; the obscure by the plain, 
not the plain by the obscure. ' If a truth be established, ' 
says Butler, ' objections are nothing : the one is founded on 
our knowledge, the other on our ignorance. ' ' We should 
never suffer what we know,' remarks Paley, 'to be disturbed 
by what we know noV Apply these rules to the present 
instance. It would be a violation of the plainest dictates 
of common sense to take this solitary passage, the full 
import of which no one can possibly understand, as the 



114 power m weakness : 

standard by which we interpret numberless passages which 
are clear to every understanding. 

"But let us examine the principle of your objection, 
You say, ' The subjection of the Son is inconsistent with 
His proper Divinity.' Surely this is a presumption. No 
mortal can tell, no angel can tell, what actions are con- 
sistent with Divinity or not, till the Divinity acts. We 
must infer from His action what is consistent with His 
nature. This is our only rule. But if we study His recorded 
actions, we find examples of perfect Divinity combined 
with subjection. Take one. We have the authority of our 
Saviour himself that He who spake to Moses in the bush 
was God. ' Have ye not read in the book of Moses how 
God spake to him in the bush, saying, I am the God of 
Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob?' 

' ' Yet He who in one sense could say in the language of 
majestic independence, 'I am that I am,' was, in another 
sense, acting in subjection, for He was the 'angeljehovah,' 
performing commissions from the throne of pure and incon- 
ceivable Divinity. Indeed, mere common sense applied to 
the subject is sufficient to silence -this objection. What is 
more familiar than this — that official inferiority implies no 
natural inferiority ? If I become your servant next week, 
should I lose any of the properties of human nature ? When 
Christ, in order to effect certain great purposes in the 
Divine empire, became the servant of the Divine Nature, 
did He of necessity lose the attributes of the Divine Nature ? 
No ; for the pen of inspiration has recorded that, even 
while He took upon himself the form of a servant and the 
likeness of man, ' He thought it not robbery to be equal 
with God.' And even if we had not the sentences of the 
Oracle to guide us, we might infer that, although He is now 
exalted, He may be subjected again ; for what has been, 
may be. 

' ' What if He should, in the exercise of ineffable humility 
and love, again condescend to assume an inferior nature, 
and, in a subordinate capacity, to perform wide and im- 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV, W. RHODES. 115 

mortal achievements in some other sphere, analogous to 
those He has performed in our own ! This paragraph 
suggests to us that this may be the case. It darkly in- 
timates that what has already taken place will be repeated, 
but in so different a form that we have no lights to 
anticipate its nature. At the end of time, and in connexion 
with a new order of things, Christ will once more descend 
from the supreme elevation which He now occupies, but 
His Divine nature will continue the same, just as it did 
when He descended before, and that Divine nature will have 
its part in that transcendent manifestation of the Godhead 
when it shall be i all in all.' 

"Meanwhile, however much our thoughts maybe con- 
founded in attempting to comprehend this infinite event, 
and whatever may be the meaning of the Son becoming 
subject to the Father, at the conclusion of this our mortal 
history, one thing is most plain and certain from this sub- 
lime passage, — The Son is not subject now; He has no 
superior in the universe. 

6 ' Another inspired declaration which you cite is this : — 
' And this is life eternal, to know thee the only true God, 
and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. ' — John xvii. 3. This 
passage is the triumph of Unitarians. i Here, ' they say, 
' Christ has asserted that the Father is the only true God, 
so as to exclude himself from being God.' All the force 
depends on the word ' only. ' If it had been said, ' Thou 
only art the true God,' such a sentence might have implied 
that our Saviour has no real participation of the Divine 
nature. But the word is very differently placed. It refers 
not to ' God, ' but to ' true ; ' not to the person, but to the 
quality of the person. * To know thee, the only true God.' 
Christ is also called the 'true God,' 1 John v. 20. He is 
not only said to be ' God over all,' Bom. ix. 5, and ' the 
great God, our Saviour,' Titus ii. 13 ; but our only Sove- 
reign, God our Lord, 1 Tim. 15, 16,. and ' the only wise 
God, our Saviour,' Jude 25, Apply to all these Divine 
announcements the principle of interpretation which you 



116 POWER in weakness: 

have already applied to one, and strange consequences will 
follow. Say that the text which describes the Father, as 
the only God, implies that Christ is not God, you must, in 
logical consistency, say that the texts which describe Christ 
as the only God, imply that the Father is not God. The 
same forms of expression are applied in both instances, and 
they should certainly be explained on the same principle. 
The objection is nothing. I believe the particular text on 
which you have taken your stand simply means this : 
' That, being endowed by Thee with authority over all 
men, He may bestow eternal life on all whom thou hast 
given Him. And this is life eternal, to know thee, the 
only true God (in opposition to the false gods they now 
adore), and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent to be their 
Saviour.' " 



VI. 

ON THE PRACTICAL IMPORTANCE OP THE SUBJECT. 

" 'After all, our acceptance with God depends not upon 
our creed, but upon our character; not upon what we 
think, but upon what we are : "he is not wrong whose life 
is in the right." Let your life be virtuous, and it can 
matter very little what your opinions may be respecting the 
rank which the Saviour holds in the universe.' Such, in 
substance, are the sentiments expressed by many as to the 
practical importance of the great topic of our inquiry. 
They wear a plausible aspect, but they conceal a fallacy, 
and are likely to mislead us to a fatal extent. For the 
conduct of every honest man is the result of his convictions, 
and every one knows that faith is an influential thing — 
for evil, if founded on an error ; for good, if founded on 
the truth. 

' ' Perhaps you will be assisted to ascertain the practical 
value of the belief we are now examining, if you allow me, 
with all respect and affection, to ask a few questions, with 






MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 117 

a view to elicit a defined idea of the effects which will 
naturally How from your present faith. 

" 1. Reject the Divinity of Jesus, and what hind of Bible 
have you left ? It must be plain to every candid thinker, 
that if the Father of spirits has indeed put forth, from the 
secret of His glory, a book which is intended for no other 
purpose than to instruct His creatures in things of the most 
momentous interest; if, indeed, as John Bunyan hath it, 
He has intended the Bible to be 'a directory to explain our 
faith and duty ; a chart showing all the roads leading to 
and from the Celestial city : ' this book for the wayfarer 
must be one that he can understand. This book must be 
written in accordance with the common laws of language ; 
the words it employs must mean the same as they do when 
they occur in other books ; and a grammatical analysis of 
these words must be the only essential process in deter- 
mining their meaning. To believe the contrary, would be 
an impeachment of the power, wisdom, and love of the Most 
High. Now, I think that the passages which have already 
been cited, though only a few out of a vast multitude, do, 
if taken in their fair and natural meaning, declare the 
Divinity of Jesus. If they were intended to convey any 
other meaning, they are not adapted to do so : meant only 
to lead, they only mislead. This would be strange if it 
were simply a human book; how passing strange if we 
regard it as divine ! Its light is given for the very purpose 
of saving us from error, but the light that leads astray is 
light from heaven ! The large majority of Christians are 
by this book alone seduced into the fearful sin of idolatry. 
It is not their fault that they misunderstand it, for, to 
understand it aright, it is needful that they should apply to 
it laws of inteqDretation peculiar to this book itself, and it 
is needful that almost every statement it makes respecting 
the Saviour should be cast into a new mould, understood in 
some new sense, or exploded into figures and shadows ; and 
this Book, given for their j)ractical guidance, though written 
by God, is a more fantastic and discordant book than wa s 



118 POWER in weakness: 

ever written by man. The Inspired Word needs an inspired 
interpreter, or it must be translated on some new principle 
not applicable to ordinary writings. 

' * I once entered upon a large and rigid examination of 
the ' Improved Version. ' It took me several weeks' labour. 
I will give you my candid opinion about it. "Where there 
is no immediate reference to the Divinity of Christ, the 
translation is uniformly just and good; in many parts, 
beautiful. But in the large variety of passages which refer 
to His birth and redeeming death, His nature and His 
elevation in heaven, it is not to be trusted for a moment. 
The creed ruled the translation, not the translation the 
creed. The worst parts of the book are the notes. Unlike 
all other comments, they do not tell what is the meaning 
of the text, but what it is not Thus a ransom is not a 
ransom ; angels are not angels ; heaven and earth are not 
heaven and earth ; the anger of God is not His anger ; the 
Saviour's being in heaven does not mean that He is there. 
Yet I believe this is the only way of dealing with the Bible, 
if you, at the same time, profess to believe it, and not to 
believe in the supreme Divinity of Jesus. But what kind 
of Bible have you left ? A. Bible without the Gospel, leaving 
this unhappy world like Egypt without the Nile. A Bible 
of doubtful meaning; — a book which for all the greatest 
purposes is no Bible at all. 

' ' 2. How can you reach the standard of apostolic piety ? 
We all admit that for holiness, for sedate patience, for 
beautiful tenderness and mercy, for self-denial, for noble 
activities of religious principle, they stand alone in the 
annals of our race ; and human beings, while on earth, can 
hope to reach no higher standard of piety than theirs. Yet 
this piety was not only connected with, but inspired by the 
loftiest sentiments towards Jesus. The illustrations of this 
given in the New Testament are too numerous to be quoted. 
Every page is a proof. Simply to show what I mean, 
however, let me refer to two or three. ' I count all things 
but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ,' 



MEMORIALS OF THE EEV. W. KHODES. 1 J 9 

Phil. iii. 8. Is there, then, no inore excellent knowledge ? 
6 1 have a desire to depart and be with — Christ, ' Phil. i. 23. 
Is there nothing higher to anticipate or wish for in heaven ? 
' For me to live is Christ, ' ver. 21. Is there no nobler aim 
of life ? ' The love of Christ constrain eth us, ' 2 Cor. Vi 14. 
Is there no mightier impulse? 'Whom not having seen, 
we love ; in whom believing we rejoice with joy unspeak- 
able and full of glory, ' 1 Peter i. 8. Is not this loving the 
creature more than the Creator ? To suppose that Jesus is 
not Divine, is an opinion which, if traced to its conclusions, 
would deprive the Apostles of nearly all their piety, and 
show their very devotion to be profane. ' Thou shalt 
worship Jehovah thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve.' 
All religious worship offered to any other being than Je- 
hovah, is worshipping and serving the creature rather than 
the Creator, who is blessed for ever. So the apostolic 
piety has no basis, no reason ; it is no piety at all, without 
the Divinity of Him to whom they gave their hearts, their 
labours, and their lives. The fact is like the sum, and 
many words respecting it can be only like the clouds. 

4 'Depend upon it, the Apostles were not so likely to be 
mistaken as you are. They ' knew whom they believed, ' 
and that could not be a wrong faith which kindled the 
inspiration of such glorious lives. Only a good tree yields 
good fruits. 

" Now turn to the other side, and ask what effects 
naturally flow from the denial of the Saviour's highest 
claims. Will ' it bring God nearer to the soul ? No ! The 
Invisible Deity is remote and sublime beyond the flight of 
thought, and when we attempt to reach Him, our noblest- 
powers faint into nothingness. But the Incarnation brings 
Him to our side ; it makes the idea of God familiar to our 
minds without impairing our reverence. The uncreated 
splendour of Divinity is tempered and softened by the mild- 
ness of humanity in the person of our Saviour — He is ' God 
with us.' On the other hand, if we refuse to receive Him, 
we can never discover that secret which our hearts are 



120 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

breaking to know, and there is no answer to the prayer, 
' Show us the Father ! ' Will it inspire us with the highest 
sentiments of gratitude and love ? No ! The rule by 
which we estimate the Father's love to us, the interest He 
feels in our happiness, and His claim on our responsive 
affection, is the value and magnitude of His gifts. ' Herein 
is love, not that we loved God, but that God loved us, and 
sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. ' But, if 
the Son be only a man, and if, consequently, His death be 
without atoning efficacy, we remember that God has sent 
thousands of good men to live and die for us. If He be 
only an angel, we know that He has devoted an innumer- 
able company of angels to minister unto the heirs of salva- 
tion ; there is, therefore, no high and affecting peculiarity 
in the advent of Jesus, and He is not God's unspeakable 
gift. If this indeed be the chief expression of His love, it 
excites no adoring surprise in comparison with what He is 
doing daily ; we are deprived of the mighty motive to 
practical godliness which is inspired and sustained by the 
thought that He has devoted to us the sharer of His ineffable 
nature, and bestowed a gift, more precious and lofty in its 
value than all the universe of life besides, and which can 
never be exceeded by any other donation that could be 
supplied from the treasury of infinite resources. Will it 
make us more reverential to His word ? No ! For it 
creates the unhappy necessity of frequent conflicts with 
many of its statements. Will it make us more obedient ? 
No ! For if we are to interpret it by the principles which 
we apply to every other book, it brings us in frequent 
collision with its laws. We cannot, according to its plain 
directions, make the Son the object of our prayers, our 
praises, our honour, and unbounded love. We cherish a 
doctrine respecting Him which is destructive of obedience 
to Him ! It is not to be doubted that many supporters of 
this doctrine have noble and generous, gracefid and en- 
dearing social qualities ; many a person standing in their 
ranks reminds us of a line in evangelical story, 'Jesus 



MEMOKIALS OF THE EEV. W. RHODES. 121 

beholding him, loved him.' We do love our friends, our 
hearts feel broken for them, but we cannot forget that as 
in their faith there is nothing to inspire, so in their lives 
there is nothing to display the prime characteristics of 
apostolic piety. Ask yourself what their system has done 
for this disordered world. Where are the trophies of its 
power? Where is its one oasis, making the wilderness 
rejoice and the solitary places glad ? 

" It is my fixed opinion that the Socinian system is the 
last perversion of the Gospel. It is like Old Sarum : the 
magnificent outline remains, but all the life is gone, — a 
sort of intellectual monument where a divine religion lies 
entombed. The tempers and energies of spiritual piety 
have never flourished long and to a large extent in any 
place or time, where this doctrine has spread. Where are 
the numerous Presbyterian churches, which, fresh with the 
beauties of holiness, adorned England little more than a 
century ago ? At that time there were nearly five hundred 
of these congregations : where are they now ? They were 
invaded by Arianism, and the fervours of Christianity 
vanished. Socinianism took its place, as the tendency of 
all error is downward ; Jesus was denied where He used to 
be adored ; and now there are not forty of these churches 
which have not faded away. 

' ' And now let me ask you this question : If you do not 
worship Christ, how can you feel prepared for the employ- 
ments of the heavenly state t Many things are wrong on 
earth, but there is nothing wrong in heaven. I wish you 
could learn to do here what is done there. You know that 
there can be no idolatry in the celestial temple, no impiety 
before the throne. You need not fear to do below what is 
done above ; rather tremble at any reluctance to do it. 
What ! not unite with the perfect spirits of the good ; not 
unite with angels ! ' Let all the angels of God worship 
Him, ' says a voice from the excellent glory. And they do 
worship Him in the spirit of loftiest praise. ' And I beheld ' 
Rev. v. Read this glorious passage. Observe that 



122 POWER m WEAKNESS. 

the Saviour receives the adoration of ' every creature in 
heaven, and on earth, and under the earth, and such as are 
in the sea.' He unites in none, He receives all. Are you 
beginning to learn that new song ? Are you preparing for 
the employments of that celestial life? That religious 
system must be fatally inadequate and unpractical which 
does not train and qualify us for the stations and services of 
our future existence." 



CHAPTEE VIII. 



4 ' These are the poets, lady dear, 
And that an old divine, 
And yonder ragged- coated books 
Are full of wisdom fine ; 

And here I hope to work for yon, 
And for my God, and for the world, 

In careful studies true. 
And ever to my growing thought 

Your word shall be as dew ; 
And He who join'd us heart and hand 

Will bless as hitherto." 

Theophiltts Trinal. 



MARRIED LIFE. 

In the year 1832 Mr. Rhodes married Miss 
Hester Knight, of Devizes. This lady, who, to use 
his own language, " had generous affection enough 
to share the lot of so afflicted a person," was herself 
no ordinary character. By her clear intellect and 
bright vivacity of thought, feeling, and speech, she 
"brought sunshine into every shady place" she 
visited. With every faculty heightened into an 



124 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

energy, and a heart fully devoted to Christ, she 
entered warmly into all her husband's self-sacri- 
ficing labours, and gave a new spring to his useful- 
ness. As she is now a spirit in heaven, it would 
only be affected refinement to conceal an interesting 
fact which preceded their marriage. She was a 
sincere inquirer after truth, but had not " so learned 
Christ" as to feel perfect accordance with the doc- 
trinal faith held by Mr. Rhodes. Her sympathies 
were with the Arians, " whose grand mistake," 
again to quote his words, " arises from not distin- 
guishing between what is said in the Scriptures of 
our Lord in reference to His inferior and official 
character as man and as Redeemer, and the proofs 
of His absolute divinity. They fix their attention 
exclusively on the subordinate terms and characters 
which the Scriptures ascribe to Him, and then assert 
that these do not amount to the assertion of His 
proper divinity ; which is perfectly true. They 
would be right if nothing more nor higher were 
said of Him. They would be right if it were right 
to form our whole view of His character from only a 
part, and that the inferior part, of what is revealed. 
But as it is, they do the same injustice to their 
Saviour that we should do to man if we took our 
whole conception of his nature from his body, 
wmich is weak, mortal, and perishing, and left out 
of view or denied his soul" 

This difference led to a prayerful examination of 
the Scriptures. For years the inquiry went on ? 
and the letters written by Mr. Rhodes, under these 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 125 

circumstances, and on this subject alone, would, if 
printed, fill a thick octavo volume. They teem 
with learning, eloquence, and close argumentative 
thought ; and were it not that those who with- 
hold from the Saviour the full ascription of divinity 
have since very generally shifted the ground of 
debate, and are now engaged in discussing a pre- 
vious question — the question of inspiration — these 
works might take their place amongst the standard 
instructions of the church. 

The effect was what might have been expected 
to follow an inquiry conducted in such a devout 
spirit, and with so much perseverance. Before 
they were united in life, they were united in faith. 
" Mean thoughts of Christ," said Mr. Rhodes, " are, 
in my view, the frost and snow of the heart ; while 
they remain, our nature cannot bloom with the 
best affections and delights of piety. I could not 
live and breathe for a week in the cold Lapland 
region of the soul to which they belong." He 
never had to live for an hour in such a region. 
To borrow language which has been used to de- 
scribe a similar instance, henceforth his life, and 
that which was identified with it, "flourished in 
the clear glow and effulgence of the Gospel 
scheme," 

In connexion with the extracts which have just 
been given, the following letter must be felt to be 
peculiarly interesting. It was written to his wife, 
when she was away from home in the summer 
of 1837 :— 



126 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

" 'My dear heart in the truth and the life, which are 
immortal, and change not.' So George Fox usually ad- 
dressed his wife. I have finished his Life of 650 folio pages, 
since you have been gone. It afforded me much amuse- 
ment ; but its chief impression is that of the highest vene- 
ration and delight for so holy and noble a servant of 
Christ. I had hitherto regarded Penn's as the most beau- 
tiful character which that sect has produced, and perhaps 
it is the most beautiful, because his mind was more culti- 
vated and polished than that of his friend; but Fox's 
character is by far the most venerable and magnificent. 
He reminds me of the inspired Tishbite in his stern majesty 
and fidelity, but he seems to have surpassed him in all 
the patient, gentle, compassionate, suffering, and laborious 
virtues. If inspiration has been granted since the Apostles 
departed from the world, I think he possessed it. I have 
read few things more truly sublime than some of his letters 
to Charles the Second. What from the pen or lips of man 
can exceed this ? — 

" 'To the King. 

' ' ' The principle of the Quakers is the Spirit of Christ, 
who delivers them from the sins against law which it is thy 
office to punish, and from many more sins which thy power 
cannot reach. We save thee from thy awful work of 
punishing evil-doers, so far as our principles are embraced. 
If all thy people followed us, and obeyed the heavenly and 
immortal Master that we obey, thou and thy magistrates 
would have no crimes to punish. This is from one who 
desires the eternal good of the king and of all his subjects ; 
in Christ Jesus our Lord, 

<"G. Fox.' 

"I will give the closing sentence of William Penn's 
most sweet and beautiful preface to this volume. ' Many 
sons have done virtuously ; but thou, dear George, hast 
excelled them all. ' 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 127 

■ ' You remember that I was reading Charming when you 
left me. I have finished and returned the first volume, 
but have not yet closed the second. When you return, J 
will give you my opinion of this fascinating writer. Great 
power and beauty are displayed in his pages ; great refine- 
ment and elevation of mind ; and many Christian virtues 
are exhibited in the most serious and beautiful light. . . 
For his personal qualities he must be a delightful and 
delighting man, with whom I should greatly love to have a 
long month's debate on the solemn topics on which we 
differ ; for it has filled me with sadness, though it has not 
impaired my admiration, to see so much splendour and 
excellence combined with a total melancholy absence, or 
rather decided and eloquent rejection, of those views of the 
gospel and of Christ which form the consolation of my 
heart and my hope of blessed immortality. Here my admi- 
ration is turned into pity and profound regret. How a 
mind so fervent, so full of compassion, so radiant with pure 
aspirations, can find repose in the cold negaticus of the 
Socinian creed, and with a good conscience can employ its 
powers to seduce and. enchant others into the adoption of 
the same moonlight and powerless sentiments of piety, is 
to me passing wonderful and sad. To those who receive 
the l^ew Testament as it is, willing and, grateful to be 
taught by the Father of their spirits, and not to dispute His 
teaching, and have found peace for eternity in the love of 
their Redeemer, how affecting it is to read the statements 
made in these beautiful pages ! That the sole terms of 
Divine forgiveness are penitence and improvement in virtue 
— that holiness is originated by our own minds — that the 
attainment of religion is as easy to our nature as the 
attainment of knowledge— that the atonement is a fiction 
of human device, and of course that the Saviour of the 
world is only the most excellent and dignified of mortals. 
Alas for our hopeless race, if this be the gospel— if this be 
all that the God of heaven has provided to redeem and 
save them ! What a deception and mockery of the deep 



128 POWER IN WEAKNESS. 

misery of all souls it would be to call this the great salva- 
tion ! By serious and thoughtful persons, whose views are 
fixed by prayerful meditation on the Scriptures, and by 
deep and mournful acquaintance with themselves, these 
volumes may be read with advantage ; while to others, 
who have no tender and awful reverence for the word of 
God, with little experience of a penitent heart, and who 
are disposed to indulge in unholy freedom arid daring of 
thought on the things of religion, these pages will prove 
like the serpent of Paradise, full of beauty, but full of 
danger to their souls. I pray for this excellent and admir- 
able man, that through divine illumination and grace he 
may ' add unto his virtue, faith ' in a Divine Redeemer ; I 
pray that his heart may be brought into tune with the 
music of heaven, with the song of the adoring and loyal 
universe, towards Him, who made the whole, and redeemed 
a part, ' And 1 beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels 
round the throne, and the living beings and the elders ; and 
the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand and 
thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, Worthy is 
the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and 
wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing.'' 
That heart which is not gratefully responsive to this temper 
of heaven, whatever other graces may adorn it, is not fit 
for the kingdom of God, where all delight to honour the 
Son, as they honour the Father." 



CHAPTER IX. 

e< Lite as my parloure so my hall 

And kitchen 's small ; 
A little buttery, and therein 

A little bin ; 
Some little sticks of thorn or briar 

Make me a fire ; 
Close by whose living coal I sit, 

And glow like it ; 
The threshold of my doore 

Is worn by the poore, 
Who thither come, and freely get 

Good words or meate." 

Herrick. 



"HIGH THOUGHTS AND HUMBLE DOINGS." 

The numerous letters written by Mr. Rhodes, in 
the early period of his ministry, might lead to the 
supposition that he wrote with great facility. But 
he was no " Knight of the enchanted pen." What 
appeared to be accomplished with negligent and 
graceful ease, was in reality the fruit of terrible 
toil. Indeed, owing to a paralytic affection, he was 
soon obliged to relinquish the use of the pen alto- 

K 



130 POWER IN WEAKNESS I 

gether, and to write with a pencil, which he grasped 
and slowly guided over the paper with both his 
quivering hands. As this infirmity increased, the 
mechanical difficulty of writing became so great that 
he very rarely attempted it. 

This was a distressing mystery. Here was a 
man of whom, when a student, Dr. Thomas Brown 
had said, " I think he will hereafter do in religion 
what I am doing in mental philosophy — clear away 
the lumber and confusion under which its simple 
and beautiful truths are usually buried ; " — a man 
who seemed born only to be a teacher, but who, 
during the largest part of his life, when most 
qualified for the high vocation by rich thought and 
ripe experience, was deprived of almost all instru- 
mental power of teaching. G-od seems to say to 
him, " Go, speak for me," and then seals his lips ; 
— " Go, write for me," and then stays his hand. 
Henceforth he is to feel the torments of a baffled 
faculty ; his most precious thoughts are to be kept 
secret ; the message he is burning to deliver must 
remain untold. 

Besides these hindrances to usefulness, he was 
always to be a great sufferer, having to cry, " Who 
shall deliver me from the body of this death % " 
Though he now had some private resources, he was 
always to be poor, always to be disappointed. 
Under these circumstances, many a servant of the 
Lord with a similar order of endowments would 
have deemed himself absolved from further service, 
would have settled down into a mere man of medi- 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 131 

tati on, a devout and refined idealist, only consoling 
himself through the rest of his lingering life with 
the sentiment, " They also serve that wait." But 
Mr. Rhodes, by the force of a strong will and an 
unquenchable spirit of love, so mastered the disad- 
vantages of his lot, and so compelled the body to 
be the servant of the soul, that he was able to per- 
form works of faith and love only like those 
wrought by such men as Pastor Oberlin and Felix 
Neff. 

Self-denial with him was studied as a science, 
in which, by some fresh contrivance or ingenious 
experiment, he was constantly making advances. 
For instance, though he delighted in flowers, even 
in these things " he pleased not himself," and his 
very garden was cultivated only that the flowers 
and seeds might be sold for purposes of charity. 
By economizing in every conceivable and incon- 
ceivable way, he was able very extensively to do 
good and communicate. 

He went about " doing good by stealth," praying 
and teaching in the houses of his poorer neigh- 
bours, and "trying," as he said, "to nurse both 
body and soul." He delighted to plod and plan 
for them, to allure them into habits of forethought 
and refinement, and to cheer them on in their 
struggles with that "armed man," Poverty. He 
helped those who were he] ping themselves, by 
systematically lending out small sums of money, 
and many a kind word and secret gift won for him 
the title of " a father to the poor." When all the 



132 POWER IN WEAKNESS I 

blankets purchased to be lent were given away, lie 
would take blankets from bis own bed, and carry 
them to some poor villager whom he had found 
lying cold at night. Thus, very frequently, " the 
blessing of him who was ready to perish came 
upon him, and he caused the widow's heart to sing 
for joy.' ' It should be said, however, that his kind- 
ness was not always followed by the happiest ef- 
fects. G-eorge Herbert thus speaks of his " Country 
Pastor :" — " He gives no set pension unto any, for 
then, in time, it will lose the name of charity with 
the poor, and they will reckon upon it as on a 
debt." Through sometimes forgetting this rule, he 
suffered the natural consequences. Here and there 
a person would take his offerings as a matter of 
course, like a toll-keeper; and occasionally there 
were instances of more repulsive ingratitude still ; 
but ingratitude affected him with no surprise. 
"We should give," he would calmly say, " expect- 
ing nothing." 

He founded a " Temperance Society" in the 
village. Aided by a generous friend who lived at 
a distance, lie established a school for the village 
children, and under the daily superintendence of 
himself and Mrs. Rhodes it was sustained in a high 
degree of efficiency. There was no medical practi- 
tioner within several miles ; he therefore fitted up 
an apartment in his cottage as an apothecary's 
shop, stored it with common medicines, procured a 
galvanic apparatus, and became the village doctor. 
As he had attended medical lectures in Edinburgh, 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 133 

liad a strong natural turn for science, and had 
acquired much practical knowledge of it, he accom- 
plished by these means a large amount of good, and 
this was the only department of his labours in 
which he acquired popular fame. All was done 
gratuitously, and if, as was sometimes the case, he 
received a present from the family of some country 
clergyman who had derived benefit from his pre- 
scriptions, or if some rich farmer, in a sudden 
agony of gratitude, extracted half-a-crown from his 
pocket, and offered it in return for the cure of his 
rheumatism, it was always devoted to some mis- 
sionary society or some benevolent fund. 

His services in the little chapel had the charm 
of primitive simplicity. Too weak to stand, he 
generally sat to preach, and sometimes preached 
almost in whispers. There was not a trace of his 
original tendency to abstract thought or ornamental 
diction. It was a father talking earnestly to his 
children. " His theme latterly," writes the Hev. 
Morgan Williams, " was that of John — God's love ; 
not as a fact of the past, but as a present reality ; 
' Little children, love God, and love one another.' 
His language was plain and appropriate ; he dealt 
much in appeal ; he was very faithful." A lady 
who was visiting at Damerham, in 1850, says : — 
" The congregation seemed like a few gathered 
from the outer world, who assembled there to 
€ worship God in spirit and in truth.' It was 
delightful to witness the decency, the stillness of 
the people, all poor, and their fixed hushed atten- 



134 power iisr weakness: 

tion. The tender pleadings of the pastor's address, 
the casting of himself and all around him in prayer 
on the Saviour, the hanging and clinging to the 
i blessed Lord Jesus,' I felt to be most sweet, 
child-like, and touching, The poor men in their 
white frocks, their rugged faces with a softened, 
thoughtful cast most evident and striking, — and 
the poor women, with their checked or spotted 
handkerchiefs neatly pinned over their shoulders, 
all looking at him, and drinking in the precious 
words which proceeded out of his mouth, — very 
much impressed me. In the weekly prayer-meet- 
ings the refinement and propriety of language used 
by the poor men who led the devotions, the coher- 
ence and conciseness of their ideas and words, were 
the happy reflected influences of their frequent 
talks with their beloved pastor. In daily converse 
with him they had acquired his spirit and much of 
his language." 

Mr. Rhodes had but little intercourse with the 
great world. He never saw a railway. Now and 
then, however, a person would make a pilgrimage 
to Damerham to witness his labours, and to enjoy 
for an hour the privilege of his conversation. This 
was ever striking and instructive, for he was always 
found brimful of arguments and opinions about 
books and sciences, but more especially about the 
great themes that most interest a Christian. No 
doubt he sometimes betrayed the faults which 
usually result from absolute and prolonged seclu- 
sion. His philosophy might sometimes become 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 135 

prosy ; a nervous visitor might sometimes feel sorely 
straitened by his demands for instantaneous defini- 
tion ; and the dialogue was too apt to be turned 
into a monologue. Still, upon the whole, it would 
not be too much to apply to him Cowper's descrip- 
tion of his own most valued friend : — 

" Grave without dulness, Jearned without pride ; 
Exact, yet not precise ; though meek, keen-eyed ; 
Who, when occasion justified its use, 
Had wit, as bright as ready, to produce ; 
Could fetch from records of an earlier age, 
Or from philosophy's enlighten' d page, 
His rich materials, and regale your ear 
With strains it was a privilege to hear. 
Yet above all, his luxury supreme, 
And his chief glory was the gospel theme ; 
Ambitious not to shine or to excel, 
But to treat justly what he loved so well/' 

His conversation was flavoured with a subtle 
and delicate humour ; he had " a keen eye for the 
comedy of life," and was ever ready to lessen with 
some blithe pleasantry the tasks and toils of those 
about him. Yet he had no toleration for aimless 
and frivolous chit-chat. " A young friend," Mr. 
Williams relates, " was once spending part of the 
day with Mrs. Rhodes. They were engaged freely 
in conversation on subjects which Mr. Rhodes 
deemed rather frivolous. In his kind and pleasant 
way he stopped them, and said, c Enough of that 
for the present, let us talk of something better.' 
He then, in his usual manner, related a fact from 
his rich fund of anecdotes, which, though bearing 



136 POWER in weakness: 

on the subject of their talk, turned it into a higher 
direction, and then left the room. ' Do you know, 

E ,' said Mrs. Rhodes, when he was gone, 6 we 

must improve; Mr. Rhodes is gone to pray for 
us!'" 

The gentleman who furnishes this incident has 
written an interesting letter, in which he makes 
the following statements : — 

" It was about five or six years ago that I first 
met my late esteemed friend. I remember being 
struck with his appearance. There stood a man of 
venerable and patriarchal air ; and though feeble 
in body, with a remarkably penetrating yet benig- 
nant eye, and with a fine and spiritual cast of coun- 
tenance, as if it belonged to one who had descended 

from a higher sphere A few kind words 

bound me to him at once ; and this was the begin- 
ning of a friendship that was most beneficial to my 
mind and heart. 

" His rare excellence of character was apparent 
even in the most brief and casual intercourse with 
him. Although there was hardly any one in the 
village who could have formed any estimate of his 
noble mental powers, all were struck with his 
goodness even in the first interview, and closer 
acquaintance enhanced the high idea of his value 
formed under first impressions. 

" Perhaps the first idea that struck one, when 
introduced to him, and made only partially ac- 
quainted with his mode of life, would be, ' Here is 



MEMOKIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 137 

a man who lives for the glory of God, and for 
nothing else.'' This was indeed the great predomi- 
nating principle of his life. His aim was to let 
religion influence him in every part of his being — 
to exhibit as much as possible the completeness of 
the Christian character, and carry out the injunc- 
tions of the apostle, c Add to your faith virtue, 5 etc. 
Few, I think, have been so successful in attaining 
this object. 

" I believe the key to the knowledge of his 
spiritual excellence may be found in a conversation 
I once had with him. He was speaking of two 
great elements of religion which he regarded to be 
defective in much of the Christianity of the present 
day, but which were possessed in an eminent degree 
by our Puritan and Nonconformist forefathers — 
namely, devoutness and self-denial. i Why,' he 
would say, with great emphasis, — 'why are these 
elements not more dwelt upon in our preaching, 
and why are our people not more frequently told 
that they cannot be Christians unless they know 
what it is to deny themselves ? ' To think of these 
at all is to be convinced of their importance. In- 
deed, by a wide construction, they may be made to 
embrace all other elements, the one denoting the 
whole aspect of the renewed soul towards God, and 
the other its aspect towards man. Few have com- 
bined the two so eminently as he did. I only 
knew one who was a man of like spirit in this 
respect — my late esteemed tutor, Dr. Pye Smith. 

" Mr. Rhodes was eminently devout, as was 



138 POWER IN WEAKNESS I 

apparent from the tone of his mind and conversa- 
tion. He had strong faith in prayer, and spent 
much time daily in its exercise. His self-denial 
was worthy of all praise. He laboured week-days 
and Sundays for the benefit of the sick and needy 
poor of the village, without receiving any remune- 
ration for ministerial, medical, or any other services. 
I never knew a man who did so much, but ex- 
pected so little in return. 

" He was remarkable for gentleness and suavity of 
manner. Any one who came near him with ex- 
cited feelings must have felt the calming influence 
of his presence. Though never giving offence, he 
was most faithful in administering reproof. He 
had perfect self-possession and extraordinary moral 
courage. 

" In conversation he displayed great clearness of 
mind, great logical powers, and would throw out 
beautiful thoughts in the most apt and expressive 
language. His views were free, and his tastes 
catholic. Naturally his mind was highly specula- 
tive, arid nothing at times delighted him more than 
' the thoughts that wander through eternity ; ' but 
from his warm sympathy with man, and his regard 
for everything that tended to his benefit and im- 
provement, this tendency had been checked, and 
latterly he valued authors and men according to 
the direct practical value of their works. At one 
time he would say, ' We want such preaching as 
Flavel's for the common people — plain, yet rich in 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 139 

evangelical sentiment.' There were many of the 
features of Methodism which he disapproved, and 
many of Wesley's sentiments which he conld not 
hold with ; but he venerated Wesley as, perhaps, 
England's greatest benefactor ; the great missionary 
to the then neglected people, and one who occupies 
a very high place in heaven. He rejoiced in the 
course of Mr. Spurgeon, and though through want 
of organic endowments, and from his peculiar order 
of mind, he himself could have no power as a 
preacher, there was nothing he more admired in 
others than this power well directed. 

" His views of the prospects of our race were 
gloomy, while doing his utmost for the dissemina- 
tion of truth at home and abroad ; he believed that 
some great change in the present order of things 
must take place before the world can be Chris- 
tianized. Like Foster, he regarded some Divine in- 
terposition of a very special kind as necessary. He 
thought that the conversion of the Jews, after their 
return to Palestine, would be the occasion. I often 
ventured to object to the notion of the Jews' re- 
turn, but he was confirmed in these views, and 
nothing could shake them." 

It is but right to say that the gloomy views 
about the prospects of the race to which this letter 
alludes sometimes deepened into such utter sadness, 
that they (seemed more like the effect of disease 
than of healthy Christian sympathy. This was 
especially apt to be shown in his feelings towards 



140 POWER m WEAKNESS J 

the young. Tender lover, patient teacher of little 
children, as he always was, when he heard of an 
infant's death he rather rejoiced than sorrowed ; for 
he only thought of it as " taken from the evil to 
come," and as safe in heaven, before it had learned 
to sin. A specimen of the sentiment he always 
retained will be seen in a letter which he once 
wrote to Mrs. Saffery. After giving a long and 
minute history of a child, and his endeavours to do 
it the highest good, he says : — 

" Thus much have I written of this young creature — this 
immortal creature, and so I could go on, feeling, as I do, a 
profound and most loving interest in her character and final 
destination. In looking at her, thoughts of her character, 
of her precious spirit, of her possible separation from the 
Father of her spirit, combined with the thought of her 
certain immortality, fill me with emotions of unutterable 
wonder and anxiety. Oh, what will she be in the future 
region, and for ever ! There are times of thought with me 
— times when feeling in a peculiar way the openings and 
beamings down of eternity, in which I cannot bear to live 
in this company of young beings. I am forced at such 
times to confine my recollections to real Christians whose 
lot and destination in the endless, awful future is provided 
for. . . . Oh that she may be a daughter of the Lord 
Almighty ! " 

In closing this estimate of Mr. Rhodes, into 
which we have been naturally led by paying a 
mental visit to him in the scene of his labours, it 
will be right to notice one more of his leading 
peculiarities — one which, if unexplained, may pro- 
duce an unfavourable and perhaps an unfair im- 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 141 

pression. No person who has read the preceding 
extracts from his papers, no person who has ever 
sat with him an hour in his cottage, will have 
failed to notice his constant habit of speaking about 
himself. Whatever the topic introduced, it would 
be illustrated by quotations from his own history 
or his own experience. Such a habit always sug- 
gests the suspicion of vanity; but sometimes this 
suspicion is unjust. He who is addicted to it may 
seem to be an egotist, while in reality he may be 
only an egoist. " To be egotistic" says Lady 
Morgan, "is to be self-talkative ; to be egoistic is 
to be self-delineativeP These qualities, though 
perfectly distinct, may be frequently confounded. 
The one is the besetment of the meanest spirits, 
the other of the noblest. Mr. Rhodes, like many 
who lead a suffering and secluded life, might some- 
times have been unconsciously led to indulge in the 
former sentiment ; but his references to himself 
most frequently sprang from the latter. With him 
it was the child-like openness of a mind that 
thought aloud, the simplicity of a student who 
looked into his own heart more than into any 
other book, and who, from what he read there, best 
understood the evil of sin, the effects of the truth, 
and the worth of a Saviour. His motive was not 
pride, but humility ; not to exalt himself, but his 
God ; and if in many forms he was accustomed, like 
the apostle, to say, " / live," it was mainly that he 
might assert with greater emphasis, — " yet not I, 
but Christ that liveth in me." 



CHAPTER X. 



"For even in age and grief thy name 
Shall still my languid heart inflame, 

And bow my faltering knee ; 
Oh, yet this spirit feels thy fire, 
This trembling hand and drooping lyre 
Have yet a strain for Thee. 

Yes ; broken, tuneless, still, Lord, 
This voice transported shall record 

Thy goodness tried so long ; 
Till sinking slow in calm decay, 
In feeble murmurs melt away 

Into a seraph's song." 



Sir R. Grant. 



CLOSING SCENES. 

In the spring of 1856 it was too plain to all 
around him that his frail frame could hold out but 
a very little longer. His life now seemed yet 
loftier, and through his speech and manner there 
breathed the fragrance of a yet more heavenly 
spirit. " Drawing near to the gates of the city, he 
had a more perfect view thereof." He arranged and 
labelled his papers, " set his house in order," and 
waited for the summons " to stand before the King. ' 






MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 143 

During this waiting time he wrote with difficulty 
part of a letter to a friend, and the following words 
extracted from it were the last his pencil ever 
traced : — 

"During the brief remainder of our life, becoming more 
religiously precious as it approaches its conclusion, may our 
God and Saviour preserve us from the calamity of living in 
vain. Let us labour and aspire to make the last stage of 
our pilgrimage more worthy of our great prospects in the 
world to come. How soon to us will it lose this mysterious 
and awful name, and be our present world ! I trust, in 
our compassionate Redeemer, that we have nothing to fear 
in that change of worlds. If we are living in His service 
and friendship, we are prepared to go, and may be de- 
lighted to go to the house not made with hands, eternal in 
the heavens, whenever the voice of our Lord shall call 



The 7th of May, only a few days after this was 
written, was his last day on earth. " It will soon 
be over," said he ; "I have now no power to carry 
out a thought — I can only ejaculate a prayer ; I 
can do nothing for my soul, or for eternity ; that is 
done." Soon after this he fell into a soft sleep. 
With a touch so gentle that the bystanders could 
not detect it, Death, like the angel of the Lord, 
smote the sleeping disciple, and in a moment un- 
known the chains were broken, and the spirit was 
free ! 

Dr. Johnson most beautifully remarks, that 
" when a friend is carried to his grave, we at once 
find excuses for every weakness, and palliations of 
every fault ; we recollect a thousand endearments 



144 POWER IN WEAKNESS : 

which before glided off our minds without impres- 
sion, a thousand favours unrepaid, a thousand duties 
unperformed, and wish, vainly wish, for his return ; 
not so much that we may receive, as that we may 
bestow happiness, and recompense that kindness 
which before we never understood." Even Mr. 
Rhodes during his life was unappreciated by many 
of those whom he benefited. To a diseased eye, the 
lustre of the sun itself, instead of being a cheering 
light, is an offensive glare ; and to diseased moral 
natures, the beauty of holiness in others is felt to 
be only a reproachful and exasperating thing ; and 
thus there were some within the circle of his in- 
fluence who ever tried to defeat his plans and blight 
his good name. In case after case, however, enmity 
was melted into love or shamed into silence, and 
at last only one opponent remained. On the day of 
the funeral even this one joined the long train of 
mourners, and went weeping with them to the grave. 
The Rev. Richard Allnutt, vicar of Damerham ? 
preached a sermon on the occasion, " esteeming it a 
privilege/' as he declared, "if he could say any- 
thing to enhance and perpetuate the respect enter- 
tained for this excellent servant of God by every 
parishioner." The text selected was, "Well done, 
good and faithful servant ; thou hast been faithful 
over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many 
things : enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." 
This sermon was printed, and is not only an inter- 
esting memorial of departed worth, but of living 
catholicity. 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 14:5 

This account of Mr. Rhodes would be unfair and 
incomplete without a closing tribute of respect to 
the beloved companion of his days, whose name 
should always be remembered in connexion with 
his own. She was honoured by God in being per- 
mitted, in a wonderful degree, to aid his labours and 
prolong his life. Like him in spirit, she was also 
like him in afflicted experiences. After his death 
she removed to Devizes, and, the victim of a tor- 
turing malady, survived until October 2 -5th, 1857. 
Her dying husband having expressed a desire that 
when her own days were ended, three hundred 
pounds should be left to the Stoke's Croft College 
at Bristol, as a token of gratitude for the advan- 
tages he had derived from it in his youth, she 
anticipated his wish, and, instead of bequeathing 
this sum as a legacy, at once gave it as a donation. 
Her latest breath was spent for Christ. Some 
glimpse of her mental character, and also a bright 
indication of her faith, may be seen in the following 
lines, dictated from the very rack of mortal anguish 
a little before her departure : — 

' ' Lord, I approach thine awful throne, 
A sinner saved by grace alone ; 
I dare present no other plea, 
But that the Saviour died for me. 

" I trust his love, so free, so great ; 
His pity for our fallen state ; 
His power so boundless to redeem 
The feeble saint that trusts in him. 



146 POWEK IN WEAKNESS '. 

"Pity my weak, my dying powers, 
Shed o'er my heart the sacred showers 
Of thy blest Spirit, till I rise 
To high communion in the skies. 

"Withhold not, Lord, the grace I plead ; 
Withhold not, Lord, the light I need ; 
Pour through my soul thy sacred rays, 
And till my fading life with praise, 

" GTive me a glimpse of sacred light, 
A vision of the Infinite, 
That shall light up my sinking frame, 
And bring fresh honours to thy name." 

Some of the disciples of Jesus content themselves 
with doing little in the service of their Lord because 
they are poor, others because they are weak, others 
because they dwell in the Meshech of some dreary 
and uncongenial sphere. Some who wear His name 
are useless on account of certain slight and almost 
imaginary ailments, — " the subtle and elegant 
agonies, the fine disquietudes of a gossamer frame." 
Others, through His grace, are doing what they can, 
and mourning that they can do no more. Others 
are out of heart, because they appear to labour in 
vain. All may derive a lesson from these pages. 
Unprofitable servants may well burn with confu 
sion, and begin to cry, " Lord, what wilt thou have 
me to do 1" while the weakest, the poorest, and the 
most sequestered workers in the great cause may see 
that in reality they are frequently most truly ad- 
vancing it, — that they are the men whom "the 



MEMORIALS OF THE REV. W. RHODES. 147 

King delightetli to honour ; " and that although they 
are martyrs, " dying daily," they are like the mar- 
tyrs of old, shaking the powers of darkness by " the 
irresistible might of weakness." If we derive all 
our motive-power from the cross, and all our inspi- 
ration from the Spirit of Jesus, and if we, forgetting 
ourselves, learn to say, " For us to live is Christ," 
His strength will be made perfect in our weakness, 
and our very infirmities will be turned into the 
means of showing forth His praise. This simple 
story may be fitly concluded in the words of the 
spiritual hero, whose life it aims to make known ; 
words which might have been a reply to the ques- 
tion, "Tell me, I pray thee, wherein thy great 
strength lieth'?" "In carrying out what my con- 
science dictates, I have much to wrestle with, and 
peculiar efforts to make ; and so would any spirit 
from heaven, if he were placed in a body like mine, 
and dwelt in a scene like this ; but the life I live in 
the flesh is spent in hourly dependence on the 
blessed Redeemer, who has said, 'He who abideth 
in me, and in whom I abide, produceth much fruit : 
for without me ye can do nothing.' There is 

POWER ENOUGH IN HEAVEN FOR US, AND WE SHALL 
DRAW IT DOWN BY FAITH AND PRAYER." 



THE END. 



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